Mind of Moog

In the Winter of 2016, my omonim [1] visited me And my Korean fiancé, her daughter, Emily To plan our wedding ceremony, Eagerly anticipating our matrimony. Before going to dinner one night, We visited a Merdardo Rosso exhibition. Illuminated by interactive light, My omonim insisted, love creates the aesthetician. I think back often to what she said: Indeed, True Relations clarify. Now, I find myself well-wed, And wise enough to never dare defy My wife or her mother In the least With no one above her I am allowed celestial peace. Returning to Ol’ Rosso, I enjoyed his plasters most oscuro, Supported only by dusky luminescence While his works in wax seemed incandescent. -James B. Moog [1] Omonim means mother-in-law in Korean.

In April 2013, the story of Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s trip to Cuba was all over the news.  They had received a hard-to-get visa that permitted them to visit our controversial island neighbor (you know, the one with the missile crisis).  President Obama was taking heat for giving them special privileges and maybe the absurdity of this situation contributed to his subsequent decision to restore U.S. diplomatic relations with Cuba and try to usher in a milder stance towards our isolated neighbor.  Regardless, I was there first.  I visited Cuba using a person-to-person exchange visa obtained for me by Washington University.  I was part of a trip led by my friend and mentor, Professor Schraibman (Pepe). Pepe had grown up in Old Havana, where a vibrant Jewish community used to exist.  This community essentially vanished after the Revolution, as Jews had been on the wrong side of too many revolutions and had learned to leave while one could under such circumstances....

My handwriting is unruly and frantic.   It crowds itself as it rushes towards the end of the line.   The congestion tightens as it closes in on this precipice and the last words begin to slip over the edge like a herd of buffalo until they are magically transported suddenly to another line like Pac Man.   When I take notes during meetings or class, it scampers after the speaker like a small dog.   It chases spastically and only catches up during lulls.   Inevitably, it falls behind and, like a child breaking into a sprint to reintegrate himself after straggling, moves into a bizarre shorthand and makes a break for it. When I write in solitude, I sometimes take the time to try and “pretty-up” my writing.   I am deliberate and careful and then my writing starts to smooth and spread out.   The words have room to breathe and they take advantage of this rare opportunity to stretch, like a man on a transcontinental flight getting up to move around the cabin ...

Once I pressed onwards in darkness without even myself for company and I wrote to drive pitons into a sheer cliff.   I tried to thread myself through them because I was afraid to fall.   I wrote to crack a whip over myself because I didn’t know why I was climbing.   I wrote myself a yarn that I stretched like Theseus as I struggled through an inner labyrinth.   I wrote whenever I could see.   I wrote to erode the Sisyphean pit. Now I write to rappel into the depths because that is where I found myself waiting.   I write to shed light on my subterranean discoveries.   Then I write to dispel the vertiginous ascent as I carry them upwards.   I write to press onwards ─ to create myself.   I write to press inwards and center myself. I write to spin my impressions on the wheel, to feel them running through my fingers as my hand guides them with a will of its own.   I write to steal from nature, like Prometheus, and give fire to my creations. ...