over 1 million copies sold across the globe in 40 languages. never in my wildest thoughts could I have imagined this. gonna take a long walk with myself and dream the big dream and sit on a bench in this enormously tiny life and say thank you thank you thank you thank you 🥺💕
Self-portrait on 18th birthday with borrowed Nikon, 2006. Strange how I often glimpse a hidden, residual sadness in photographs once they cross the threshold of a decade from being taken. Could it be that distance itself creates a kind of longing, not to live again the years, however painful or joyous, but to do them in another way? Just once? Here I am, hair cut by my mom, no poems written yet, with a camera lent to me by a friend to document his punk band that played in Connecticut basements. Why I was compelled to take this, I don’t know. Was I ever myself or merely a matrix of occurrences in one moment, and then yet another the next? Anyway, I want to hug you, wordless, younger Ocean, and I want it to mean nothing. Nothing at all.
This week marks the 5 year anniversary of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous being in the world. I never imagined this book would have the life it does. But a book is nothing without the people who shepherd it into the hands of readers—the most crucial of these being teachers and librarians. It’s therefore with great sadness that I woke to news that On Earth has been completely banned in Conroe,Texas in its recent wave of censorship. A local teacher close to the matter: “I’m not sure if y’all are aware, but Conroe ISD has banned Ocean Vuong’s book On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. It is not allowed in the libraries or the classrooms. The district banned it using an informal library review committee, so the public was never given notice or a chance to respond.” If you’re familiar with a LGBTQIA center or independent literary or community organization near or in Conroe, please let me know. I want to send them free copies of my books so that people who want them can find them. In a country whose legal precedents include the obscenity trial of Ginsberg’s Howl and many others, it is hard to imagine we are still here. But fascism is a weather that returns with the seasons and at a time where American funded bombs have destroyed every university in G@za, when books left behind by refugees are being burned, when queer and trans rights are being decimated monthly, I am also not surprised that acts of brazen erasure are occurring everywhere. I will do whatever I can to fight this. I have worked too hard, survived too much, to be silenced now. cover photo: @samcontis #happypride
This week marks the 5 year anniversary of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous being in the world. I never imagined this book would have the life it does. But a book is nothing without the people who shepherd it into the hands of readers—the most crucial of these being teachers and librarians. It’s therefore with great sadness that I woke to news that On Earth has been completely banned in Conroe,Texas in its recent wave of censorship. A local teacher close to the matter: “I’m not sure if y’all are aware, but Conroe ISD has banned Ocean Vuong’s book On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. It is not allowed in the libraries or the classrooms. The district banned it using an informal library review committee, so the public was never given notice or a chance to respond.” If you’re familiar with a LGBTQIA center or independent literary or community organization near or in Conroe, please let me know. I want to send them free copies of my books so that people who want them can find them. In a country whose legal precedents include the obscenity trial of Ginsberg’s Howl and many others, it is hard to imagine we are still here. But fascism is a weather that returns with the seasons and at a time where American funded bombs have destroyed every university in G@za, when books left behind by refugees are being burned, when queer and trans rights are being decimated monthly, I am also not surprised that acts of brazen erasure are occurring everywhere. I will do whatever I can to fight this. I have worked too hard, survived too much, to be silenced now. cover photo: @samcontis #happypride
i love you, earth
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
thank you, Ireland, for showing me some of my roots, for your deep reverence for the written word, and how the word works alongside and within calls for justice, for your open verdant heart, for letting me perform and run around with my good friend @joshokeefeofficial and, crucially, for not giving me a hard time when I got wasted on just the foam of a Guinness! and for one of the warmest receptions a first-time visitor could ever ask for. already plotting my many returns! 🍃💕✨
dependably depressed at parties, even then. #happypride✨.
Nan being Nan 💕
Nan being Nan 💕
Nan being Nan 💕
some shots from the local high school graduation 🌱
some shots from the local high school graduation 🌱
some shots from the local high school graduation 🌱
some shots from the local high school graduation 🌱
some shots from the local high school graduation 🌱
some shots from the local high school graduation 🌱
“Ben turning 45” Washington Square Park, 2024 Grateful to know this kind, graceful, and fiercely intelligent man through these 15 years (and counting!) of living, losing, art making, crying, and laughing. For a writer whose eyes are always wide open to the inner and outer worlds we wade through, it’s a personal joy to catch him in this sweet, brief moment of reprieve.🌱 #benlerner
