Our Shared Futures coming to Fresno!

Thanks to Tamejavi-PVI and the Holistic Cultural and Education Wellness Center, this Friday night, I'll be doing my final event for the 21st National Poetry Month, presenting a selection of my award-winning science fiction poems from over the years and discussing the importance of science fiction and fantasy for Southeast Asian American communities rebuilding their lives in the US.

As the President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Poetry Association, this will also serve as a good lead-in to Asian Pacific American Heritage Month in May.

The event is free with doors opening at 6:30 PM. Please feel free to invite friends, families, and anyone who is interested in writing. I'd love to meet them! I'll have books for sale there and will be signing them.

As a heads up, based on my upcoming commitments this is the last time I will be in the Central Valley for several months and possibly the rest of the year, so I do hope you can make it!

Meanwhile, from earlier this week, here's abig thanks to Ignacio López-Calvo, Director of the UC Merced Center for the Humanities for a wonderful introduction as I began my brownbag conversation "Why the Lao Imagination Mattered."

We were looking at the 40 years journey of bringing diverse voices forward, challenging both internalized racism and external dismissal, systems of censorship and the lack of resources for cultural production and expression. To create culture shift is never something that can be taken for granted, but it is possible. And it has often begun in colleges very much like the UC Merced with youth very much like the ones I spoke to this month.

While no one can guarantee the future, it is my hope that in my time here, at least one of them heard my message I have been trying so hard to share: "It's possible."

And ten years from now, we may just see something really amazing from them, if not sooner.