Take My Name but Say It Slow: Essays

This meditative debut collection from Dai, a creative writing professor at the University of Idaho, explores the intersection of geography, identity, and sexuality. In “Running Days,” Dai traces his relationship with his late grandfather through runs he’s taken throughout his life, reflecting on how exercising connects him with his past (“I return to where I’ve been: the hills and the back roads, the Arizonan arroyos, that oval track in Wenzhou” near his grandfather’s house). Ruminating on his practice of photographing expressions of love carved into rocks, trees, and other landscape features, Dai wonders what traces remain of his hookups with men he met while traveling through Europe and Asia in his 20s: “These men have toured me, and I have transited them in turn, each of us seeking some congress with difference.” Buoyed by coruscating prose, the selections gracefully probe questions of place and personhood. For instance, the standout “Queer Cartographies” revisits the locations of Dai’s romantic and sexual escapades—the Tennessee summer camp where he met his first boyfriend, Provincetown’s “Dick Dock” cruising spot—and concludes with the insight that “all queers have these spaces we miss, spaces that taught us to be queer, whether or not we lived up to their tutelage.” Touching and keenly observed, this packs a punch. (Jan.)