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be-the-glenn-to-my-maggie · 1 year

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You know what I want to see a lot more of? Cultural meshing or whatever the hell you call it. I want to see how human and na'vi culture (among other things) could be learned and respected by both sides. For so long, all the Na'vi have really experienced is the war side of humans, and though I agree that we as a species can be pieces of shit (especially to our planet, etc) I also want to see the highlighting of all of the culture and stuff we've created over the thousands of years we've existed. I want someone to continue what Grace started and could have continued to grow until it flourished if it weren't for that fateful day.

I want to see two friends, one human and one na'vi, speaking to eachother. Only the human is a language nerd/polyglot and is enthusiastically trying to find out everything they can about the Na'vi language and its various dialects while at the same time excitedly introducing their na'vi friend to words in not just English but Spanish, Greek, etc. They're so excited to be teaching their Na'vi friend English while at the same time learning Na'vi and showing them all the cool language families back on Earth. I want them to explain the concept of a dead language, how things can fade with time, how without our ancestors voices there is a constant shift generation after generation, slow but sure. ("Oh, so you guys say herwìva! That's so cool, we call them snowflakes in English. Oh, and look: in French they're called flocon de neige.")

I want to see a bright-eyed young religion/other enthusiast chatting away about Eywa and all of the Na'vi stories all the while having no problem showing their na'vi friend the absolutely ridiculous amount of books on mythology, demonology, christianity, and all that other stuff. Folklore, fairytales, you name it! ("Yeah, and then Zues banged another lady! I know, he never learns!")

I want some random tree-lover fighting for what little trees are still left on Earth to get so excited that he makes entire slideshows about all of the trees they had back on Earth and are fighting to bring back and what so many of them symbolize, etc. ("What's that? Oh, no, you can't really build a home inside a redwood tree. Uh. . . maybe a treehouse? Wait, you guys don't have treehouses? Omg we have to build one! We'll only use fallen branches, I promise! Pretty please!")

I want to see a poet or writer roll up onto Pandora with their ungodly amount of literature who loves reading to the na'vi children and teaching them how to write fun little poems, etc, all while at the same time paying close attention to the na'vi stories and writing them down, compiling them and even memorizing some of them to connect more with her students. ("I am sam, am I am, do you like green eggs and ham?" "And then the brave Entu snook up behind the might Toruk. . ."

I want games of London bridge and ring-around-the-rosie played right alongside traditional na'vi child games, young children connecting with young na'vi. ("And then you bring your arms down around him and boom! He's out!" "Ooh, what's that you're doing? I wanna try! Do all na'vi play this game?")

I want fun cooking/food classes where they alternate between learning about na'vi food culture and human food culture and they get to truly see how rich the na'vi food culture is while at the same time seeing the same thing about people on Earth. ("I promise you, ice cream is man's best fucking invention ever! And there's so many different kinds and so many different ways of making it, too! Hey, what do you guys do for dessert? Are they fruit based?")

I want trips to places like the beach where a sweet instructor brings pictures of beaches on Earth in the past and shows the others where crabs would have been or some other oceanic shit all while the na'vi instructor teaches them about Pandora's beaches. (no reason in particular for this one, I've just been wanting to go to the beach recently 🤷)

I want people who rode horses (both for equestrian sports and pleasure) to be in awe of the pa'li and to show the na'vi various different moves, games, etc, that they did on their horses via pa'li through things such as videos, pictures, all that fun stuff. ("And this right here is called puissance. You have no idea how long me and my horse had to train to make it safely over that jump!")

I want humans explaining the sheer amount of effort it takes in bonding with an animal. Months, years. And even then you can never be too sure. There is no tsaheylu, no "becoming one". We have to work hard, so hard, for every skill. Every trick. Everything. And even when all is done, there is always the chance of miscommunication. Of you making one wrong move and a horse you've known since you were four bucking you off, or your dog biting you if not trained properly. We are never one, always separate, no matter how close we get. Understanding only goes so deep, and yet we take risks day in and day out because we love our dogs and horses and any other animal we may have conflicts with.

I want humans explaining the fear. And yes, everyone feels fear (especially when colonial idiots pull up *cough* Quaritch *cough*), but for humans? It has always been a constant. There is no Eywa. Our perception of everything is completely different from a na'vi, who spends their whole life connected to their planet. We are alone in our minds, in our perception. When we die, there is only death. Our ancestors are lost in the wind. We are each left to interpret everything in the ways we know how, and we are so weak. Killed so easily. Everything is a threat. The ocean, a tree, animals, mountains, nature. Everything that gives us life takes it away, only there is no Eywa telling us that it is alright. That there is balance. For us, there is just panic and pain and fear, as we are attacked from all sides, begging for answers we'll never get. So we protect ourselves in the only ways we know how. Houses. Machines. And the fear, over time, our justification. (Not sure if what I'm trying to say made any sense at all lol.)

And I want na'vi taking this in, not forgiving us for our wrongdoings (because we have no right to ask that of them) but for them to just see us the way they claim to see so much. For them to see us and us to see them and for there to be understanding. No "demons". No "savages". Because that's not how it is. It's just two different mindsets brought on by two very different planets.

But what I want most of all?

A slushy tbh. Gonna go drive to my local 7/11 now. That's enough depression for one day.

Wow what a very emotional ask! I really love this! My favorite human things that fics tend to have Jake bring to the Omaticaya are small but meaningful I think. Curse words, photos and videos, children's games (the marking their height on the wood!!), high fives and pinky swears, flipping people off, books, and slang for sure.

In regards to most of this I think Norm is your GUY. I refuse to believe he doesn't teach his 50 million adopted children to read and write along with history and culture and biology, Earth and Pandora. The rest of the village kids TOTALLY get in on these lessons they all want to learn, they get jealous of their friends. Norm taking over and restructuring Grace's school is my FAVORITE headcanon, I love the idea that Spider joins him in lessons after he gets older if he never gets an avatar or gets Eywa blessed.

#anyways what an absolutly lovely ask anon #looove this idea #obsessed #i love specifically the omaticaya and the scientists relationship as their lives go on #miles spider socorro #spider socorro #norm spellman #avatar #avatar the way of water #james cameron avatar #melissa's asks #melissa on avatar (cameron)#the people need this fic we are begging for it

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kitchen-light · 1 year

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Danusha Laméris, from "Bonfire Opera", University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020 [ALT TEXT under cut]

“Chance” by Danusha Laméris

They talked about it while soaking in an unusually deep red tub at his rented house. How the constellations had gone out of their way to align, so that their paths converged for a time in the redwoods, in a shingled cottage above the creek. It was all so perfectly temporary. He had easier hours at work. She, the willingness and freedom at midday. Even some nights. Statistically improbable that their bodies fit together the way they did. And that the words he whispered fit so seamlessly inside her ear. But― isn’t it written in the Holy Books?―the gods do not like to dole out too much honey, so as not to saturate the palate. Or the soul, which must be allowed its hungers. And this was honey by the spoonful: He played guitar and sang for her while she soaped her limbs. He peeled off her robe with his teeth while she read him his favorite poems by the fire’s last flame. Perhaps it is a mercy to have such limits. Isn’t unimpeded pleasure almost unbearable? And isn’t there always someone, just outside the frame, who has to pay? When the ancient astrologers began to track the bodies of heaven, they must have meant to catch the gods at the moment of their brief indulgence, that softening, when they allow us more than just a little taste. And right before, in their infinite and merciless wisdom, they take it back.

#danusha lameris #danusha laméris #poetry #typography #words #found*#on love

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painless-innit-colourful · 1 year

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Orpheus

(3k words, tw for canon-compliant suicide and mild self-harm, read it below or on my ao3)

Throughout his life, Wilbur Soot was a musician. In death, Wilbur Soot was a musician. In what came after...(Basically, if c!Wilbur had written all of Wilbur Soot's music in Dream SMP canon, how, and when.)

Full fic below :))

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He’d always been a musician.

His dad’s best friend used to call him Orpheus. He’d be about to leave, standing in the door frame and he’d call, “Orpheus?” down the hallway. Wilbur would shake his head and cross his arms and answer, “Yes?” “Don’t look back.”

He’d taught him confidence: how to hold his head up, how to keep his voice steady talking to a crowd and, most importantly, how to hold his own with someone that wanted to see him burn. Some lessons less applicable to his future plans, but Technoblade thought it important he knew these things. Even for a budding songwriter, pockets lined with scraps of paper shrouded in scrawled lyrics and chord structures.

“Regardless of whether they’re laughing at your poems or crying at your songs, you keep your eyes on the crowd. It’s a dangerous world out there; I don’t want to see Phil grieving you.” “Relax, Blade,” His guitar was laying precariously in his lap as he leant back, arms behind his head. “I’m hardly going far. I’m not going to start any trouble.” Techno’s eyes seemed to glint, the flames of the fire reflected in his irises as he watched Wilbur across the room. A log crackled and tumbled into the hearth with a beat that could fit cleanly in a two-four bar.

“Well, don’t let anyone convince you you’re any more or less than what you are.” “What’s that supposed to mean?” “You know yourself better than anyone: your strengths, your weaknesses, what drives you to keep writing and singing. If anyone tries to make a myth or a mess of you-” “‘Know thyself, know thy enemy,’ right?” His eyes glinted back, the righteous fire of oats unsown, youthful energy and boldness. Techno resisted the urge to roll his eyes, “You can hold your own, we both know that. Don’t let anyone convince you you can’t.” He paused, “Don’t turn around.”

Wilbur blew a long breath between his teeth, “If I write you a ballad, will you stop telling me that.” Techno just laughed.

Yes, he was always a musician, leaving home with his guitar hefted over his shoulders. Waving at his father and his friend. Techno made the ‘turn around’ sign as he left.

Open mic nights and tavern gigs didn’t satisfy the itch, the hunger inside to create, to share, to make something people would belt at the tops of their lungs long after the alcohol ran dry and the torches burnt low. In the end, it wasn’t even his melody. That part vexed him, partially - his biggest hit and it wasn’t his melody - but he hushed the musician inside and tucked his guitar lovingly into his enderchest, to be brought out on special occasions or when Tommy looked a little low.

Playing by the light of a campfire, within the walls of a nation he built, fought and died for, ran, was all he wanted to do. When the volume of paperwork was insurmountable, when the treaties didn’t write themselves, when he spent countless nights gripping a tear-stained pillow, listening to Tommy and Tubbo staying up half the night in the next room, praying he could keep them safe - those notes, those words were his sanctuary. People spoke of how it made him a down-to-earth ruler; the President sat among his people, leading them in a soft singalong of the anthem, but he didn’t do it for optics. He’s a poet, not a politician (how on earth did this happen) and it felt good to retreat behind his guitar for a while. It gave him perspective: how far he’d come, how much further he could still go. This was so much bigger than a kid writing lyrics by the campfire in the garden. The special place they sang of, he made that happen. Playing by the fire, he imagined the future: retired, moved on from a life of public service, but still playing. Resting under his redwood trees, resolutely strumming that old guitar, safe in the nation he made.

It’s a shame it didn’t last. He remained a musician, but there would be no playing with aged hands within the black and yellow walls.

His hands were cold. He had always strummed with his fingers before, but after moving into that ravine, he started using a pick. His melodies sloped into sharps and flats, shaking fingers unable to find the right fret.

“Ridiculous, aren’t I?” Techno stopped walking, glancing down at the skeletal figure of Wilbur, swamped in a trenchcoat and curled around the guitar Phil bought him for his sixteenth birthday. “All that time in L’Manberg, I said I wished I had more time to write and practice, now I’ve got it and I can’t even be happy with that!” “Well, they do say tragedy makes good art.” “Mmm,” Wilbur gazed up at the ceiling of their cavern home, wrinkling his nose. “I’ve found it hard to know what to write about. All this time I was saving up ideas and now I have all this time and nothing- nothing’s working.” “Keep… Yeah, keep working at it. You gotta persevere with it, or something.” “Sweat your guts out,” Wilbur gave him a forced grin. “You got it, Blade.”

Techno didn’t hear it himself - he had been at his secret base at the time, putting together experimental weapons and mostly trying to not blow himself up in close quarters. He heard what it had been, though, the next time he went to Pogtopia and Tommy Innit ran up to him.

“You didn’t put Wilbur up to this shit, did you?” “Tommy, what are you talking about. I haven’t been here in two days.” Tommy took the deepest breath known to man, dragging his fingers through his hair and finding a number of tangles on the way. “Wilbur’s- Wilbur’s gone a bit… A bit morbid, in his song-writing lately.” He laughed nervously. “I thought the singing about stalking government officials and comparing his heart to a bleeding - literally bleeding - keyboard, was weird, but now he’s going on about- about blowing up L’Manberg-” “Oh really?” “Yeah! It was this creepy two-chord tune about burning the place to the ground and he was playing it over and over for hours-”

He finally heard it himself a few days later, tucked between the usual laments on past lovers and agonising teenage angst - two chords, over and over, echoing through the cavern, Wilbur’s voice reverberating after it like the melody and accompaniment were chasing each other the length of the ravine. He listened to the words - the ones he could make out - and heard the smile in Wilbur’s voice as he bastardised the lyrics of his own nation’s national anthem. That was brilliant for Techno’s plans, but, still.

He had a feeling the musician hadn’t listened to him.

“How does the story end?” Wilbur had been fourteen when they’d met and every bit the child his father had made him out to be. Curious, reckless, idealistic, a dreamer, an intellectual and a poet. Techno saw trouble coming down the tracks before anyone else did. But not quite like this.

“Well, the doubts in his mind grew to be overwhelming. Orpheus looked back and Eurydice was there. He met her eyes… and she disappeared.” He watched Wilbur form a chord on the neck of the battered guitar they’d found abandoned in the woods with clawed fingers. “...Then what?” “That’s it. That’s the end.” Wilbur looked up, “What happened to Orpheus after?” Techno thought for a moment before he spoke, “Well, like most Greek myths, there are a few versions. Most of them agree that he walked the earth lamenting his tragedy, singing about it. His songs were so full of sorrow they made mothers miscarry and willow trees bow their boughs - that’s where they got weeping willows. After that… I think the general consensus was people got so sick of him making them all sad that a group of them tore him apart.” “Just- Just like that?” “Yeah. Just like that.”

Wilbur, even in the pit of his breakdown, spoke of a symphony. Once a musician, always a musician, it seemed. L’Manberg was his great, “unfinished” symphony, he said. He rambled on and on to Techno and Tommy and cave walls about movements and variations, weaving notes between the peaks and troughs of the story.

“The explosions will be like percussion, finishing the final movement - which is ironic of course, because it’s unfinished, intentionally so. The silence after-” He closed his eyes and stilled, imagining it, a smile growing. “Yes. I’d like to hear the silence after. That’s how it’s meant to end.” He turned, trenchcoat flying out, to face Techno again. “Have you ever heard of the Curse of the Ninth Symphony?”

He had been standing at the back of the crowd, Dream whispering nonsense in his ear, trying to rile him up. Truth was, he already knew exactly what he was going to say. He’s an orator. But as the hopeful L’Manbergian’s hung on Tubbo’s every word, he instead watched the figure near the front that had just stepped down from the stage. He observed the conflicted expression on Wilbur’s face. He’d just witnessed the paradox - backing Techno’s anarchy, denouncing the government and rejecting the presidency in the same breath he used to smile at his boys and hand power to Tubbo.

He watched the doubt creep in. And Wilbur looked back, past Techno, eyes glazed over, towards the hill where he knew the button room to be.

And L’Manberg disappeared.

The guitar came and went repeatedly. He wasn’t even sure how he had it sometimes. It was better not to think. Because thinking meant remembering. Just play. Just let your shaking hands find the right frets in the dark while you stare at the insides of your eyelids because if he had to look at the damn advertisements in the train stations satirising his downfall one more time he would hurl the guitar onto the tracks again, and who knew how he even got the damn things in the first place

Wilbur used to hate barre chords with a burning passion. Just buy a fucking capo. Who even has an index finger that strong anyway. Ghostbur, however, loved them. Finally, for the first time since he was like sixteen, he felt like he was writing melodies that made sense. They just flowed out of him like the water running under the L’Manberg highways. Like someone else had written them, and they were songs he’d always known. He finally felt like a musician again. Phil, his father, sat nearby, listening to him play in the November evening air. The sky was overcast, but the lanterns (his lanterns!) shone overhead like stars, lighting up the quiet marketplace.

“You used to play like that when you were little,” Phil said softly as he played on. “The brighter chords and stuff.” “Mm,” It made Ghostbur glow, sharing his music with his father again. He couldn’t understand why Alivebur had wanted to hide his lyrics from him. “Play the one about- walking boots? Again.” “Hiking boots,” he said with a light laugh. “Yeah, that one.”

They wrote as a duo, subconsciously: like a pair of writers in a band wrestling for creative control while simultaneously stealing all of each other’s ideas. Ghostbur would argue the ‘hiking boots’ song was about his son. Wilbur shouted back: it was about Sally, it was about shattered families, yes, it was about Fundy but not in the way you bloody think! Ghostbur smiled and played the songs until his fingers would’ve bled, were they corporeal. Wilbur screamed at the walls of the station until his voice was completely gone, beating at the walls with his fists, bloodying his hands until they could no longer hold the neck of his guitar.

Gradually, his hands healed. He tossed the guitar away in his rages so he didn’t smash it against the tube station wall (though he had tried it a few times and found it incredibly cathartic). In his infinite patience, waiting in the dark for salvation that would never come, he played better music than ever before. He made a makeshift capo from a strip of fabric ripped from his shirt and a piece of a shattered sign and played weeping melodies in wonky thirds and fourths. Music was his salvation: this time from utter destructive madness. More than once he bit at the skin of his fingers ‘till they bled, then used them to write chord progressions on the wall in rusty blueish-brown. He hummed the harmony line to his melodies as he played them and wished for another instrument, a way to record; literally any of the things he knew he could never have in this homemade hell. The lonely busker spent a decade serenading the empty platform with his songs of brutal tragedy.

“Did you say you’d thought of a new one?” “I did, I just want to tweak my lyrics-” “You’re rewriting my words… You know you need author’s permission to do that.” Ghostbur swore the songs just popped into his head, often almost fully formed, only requiring minor tweaks. He ignored the whispers in his mind in the voice that sounded like his own. Listening to that voice hadn’t gotten Alivebur anywhere. “Originally, the bridge was about trains, but now I’m thinking that’s not very relevant to here, where there are no trains. So I- hold on… I got it.”

Wilbur just scowled as his ghost sang of “barriers on the highways”. My genius is being pilfered, he thought. He picked up his own guitar and played along.

“There’s a reason / L’Manberg puts barriers on the highways / There’s a reason / They fail…”

In Limbo, there was very little melodic sound. Sure, there were trains rattling through every few hours, the wind whistling in the tunnels, and he could always shout ‘till his echo bounced out of earshot, but there wasn’t a lot other than that to be heard. His guitar had been the one thing that kept him from going truly ‘round the bend.

Groaning, screeching, screaming, wailing, scratching, shrieking: it was technically the most horrible noise Wilbur had ever heard in either of his lives. Yet, he loved it. In the blur of the train journey back Wilbur wasn’t sure of much. He heard the ear-splitting screeching, saw the weeping ghost, threw up out of one of the train windows and screamed along to the great noise, harmonising with it the best he could until they burst from the tunnel, light streaming through the windows, so bright Wilbur thought he was dying again.

Several days later, Wilbur was still singing. Sopping wet from the rain, one drink deep in a rowdy tavern where the whole world was warm and beautiful. Dimly, he was aware some of the pub patrons were giving him stern looks, but he was too deeply in love with life to even fathom that he could leave her behind again. No, he was singing, he was happy- no, ecstatic, to be alive, and emboldened by this latest turn of good fortune. He was a musician, and though he hadn’t found his old guitar again yet, he wasn’t going to be discouraged. As if it were Fortune herself daring him, a man appeared by the bar with an instrument strapped to his back.

“Evening, good sir. I couldn’t help-” The stranger in the trenchcoat with the immovable grin did not wait for him to turn around before launching into some half-prepared spiel. “-but notice the bass on your back. Do you play?” “I do, I do.” “Well?” “Yes, I would say well.” Ash had not been expecting to be quizzed on his musical ability that night, but it was a frequent-enough occurrence that he wasn’t phased. Until- “That’s wonderful. Do you have a job.” “I- Yes. I work here, actually. It’s my night off today.” “That’s fantastic. Quit your job.” The stranger was either absolutely plastered or a complete maniac. He allowed him the benefit of the doubt, “Why?”

The stranger flipped a strand of wet hair out of his eyes, “Join my band. I’ve got a drummer and a guitarist. And I sing. I’ve already written some songs, they- the others liked them,” He stood a little taller. “I think you’ll find us a worthwhile endeavour.” Despite the fact this entire encounter was completely ridiculous, Ash was inclined to keep following the thread. “What kind of songs do you write?” “Oh, pretty standard stuff,” He laughed, practically glowing. “Being jealous of your ex’s new man, being afraid of the future, making fun of past presidents. That sort of material.” Ash quirked an eyebrow, “Which past presidents would those be?” The stranger, Soot, grinned, “Any of them. All of them.”

Soot stuck a hand out, “What’s your name?” They shook, “Ash. Yours?” A sly smile, “You already know it.”

“Just one more thing, Ash.” Soot’s eyes were more tired now, darting up from the comm name and number he was scrawling on a napkin in a sputtering red biro. “One rule. For the band. Once you’re on board, you ride it to the end. You keep your head up high and no matter what-” He finished the number, securing it with an exuberant dot, and handed it to Ash. “You don’t look back.” Ash nodded, “Sounds good to me.”

In life, death and that which came after, Wilbur had always been a musician.

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Taglist: @fruitpilled @zrenia @spaceheatertrash @waitblues @kinda-late-but-here-though @icyisweird @boomybelovd @thatfriendlyanon @rozugold

#dream smp #crim writes #wilbur soot #techoblade #philza #tommyinnit #ghostbur #tubbo #also ash from lovejoy is here but i won't maintag him #thank you so much for reading :))#FIRST FIC OF 2023 WHOOO!!#i have literally been sitting on this idea since wilbur was resurrected. april 2021. it took me nearly two years to write this thing lmao #i really hope it came out half decent XD

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nahhhlina · 10 months

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My first full-length poetry collection, Toska is out now from Deep Vellum! The gorgeous cover art is by Katy Horan.

You can find it at the following places:

Deep Vellum

Bookshop.org

City Lights

Open Books

Barnes & Noble

Target

Amazon

your favorite local bookstore, if you ask!

If you’d like an inscribed copy, please get in touch with me here.

These are poems about the untranslatable but essential concepts that form us, and Alina Pleskova is the interpreter of their simultaneous hold and flight: “What you call me in the dark / isn’t what I am / & that helps me float / above the moment.” Toska is a book of the immigrant daughter in her not-quite-own world, and a book of contempt for striving and capitalism—but the centripetal force that powers these poems is the nameless part of the self, “ruthlessly / down for whatever,” the locked room that nobody can open even while you long for a breach. Pleskova, generous and funny and modern, is a poet of forthright intimacy. —NIINA POLLARI, author of Path of Totality

Alina Pleskova’s debut collection is into grabbing things by the neck, & not always gently: eros in the ancient bedroom & the age of apps; transcendence & complacency & spirituality under capitalism. Pleskova’s poetics is deliciously generous, even in its moments of ambivalence; reading Toska is like chatting with your best friend about pursuing & evading pleasure while the American project unravels. These poems don’t just see to the heart of queer & immigrant subjectivities; they enact them. I sank with this book, was buoyed by this book—how it, like so many of us in America, experiences perpetual attempt, failed translation, the feeling that we are always missing something just beyond our reach. If only we could tighten our grip, want wanting itself, we might unearth language for identity & desire language, of course, being ephemeral, timeless, fleeting, & stunning, all at once. —RAENA SHIRALI, author of summonings and GILT

Alina Pleskova's Toska bears the burden of the eponymous longing melancholy of living even as it phases into the burn of real threats to human-and humane-existence. Writing from "The country where I live- / its surveillance of us surveilled by the country I'm from-" she counterpoints the impersonal gaze of the state and algorithms that follow our movements with the poet's infinitely careful attention to the flow of the everyday: "Made it this far / without mentioning the rain. // Here it is; it's perfect." Solace is found in community, the imperative to "Daydream what mutual care could do," the vast motions astrology tracks, ancient poet gossip. Overwhelmingly, too, in the mysteries of queer desire and its dream of transcendence, the desire to desire unbounded by intolerance, or worse-murder. These poems telegraph in a seductive whisper that keeping each other alive is enough-it's everything, because "I want the class wars to start, but everyone's so tired." The poet asks, "What song was playing when my heart's chambers I got thrown open to let these breezes in?" This book is the song, its frequencies coming through the voices of friends, lovers, family, the poets of the past, and Pleskova's tender plaint that would "Mourn the redwoods, fireflies, platypuses, permafrost, all else that deserves to outlive us & won't ..." In her hands, poetry is the hack for our earthly hangover, toska / saudade its secret sauce in whose ingredients hide the seeds of a new world. We'll be together there,' "covered in each other's hair." —ANA BOZICEVIC, author of New Life

Reading Toska was a spiritual and whole-body experience. I laughed, I screamed, I teared up, I nearly bought a one-way ticket back to Moldova, I called my mom. No one captures the poetics of eros and diasporic longing amid our late-stage capitalist hellscape like Alina Pleskova. 'Assuring various robots / that I'm not a robot several times daily' does not prevent our speaker from 'stockpil[ing] intimacies almost too ephemeral to clock.' And what a gift this book of intimacies is. Toska is a tender and wry instruction manual for navigating desire and the void. I will follow Alina Pleskova anywhere. —RUTH MADIEVSKY, author of All-Night Pharmacy

#deep vellum #poetry #poems #alina pleskova #lit #katy horan

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antitheticaldreamgirl-13 · 3 months

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a poem about comp het and witches

I don’t want to look for him, my supposed soulmate

I want him to look for me

Pick apart the words I would have carefully crafted in my notes app

Uncover the rambling messages I would have sent

Understand that I feel what would be butterflies

That on rainy days

In the car

Droplets traveling down the smooth glass of windows

He is the first thing on my mind

Or should be on my mind

And I want him to make it alright and right

To make the potential the reality

Who knows?

Maybe he can

But there *you* are, so unexpected

And sometimes kindness is the greatest sting

I imagine we’re dancing when we’re walking,

Confiding when we’re talking,

That I’m learning when I’m stalking,

And I found you

But you didn’t find me

What do you say to the girl you love, to *her*?

She’s perfect for you (she isn’t clumsy, and she doesn’t trip into closets, and she doesn’t have to drop hairpins)

You chase her across tennis courts

Around school campuses you make fun of

To impress her

In yachts you avoid inviting anyone to

Except her

And maybe you cracked a joke about my inability to serve

About how you wish I was there

About my persistent insistence on listening to Taylor Swift and, yes, Girl in Red, too

But I can’t chase you across tennis courts and around school campuses and in yachts

Because you know how to hide

Next to the redwood trees

Behind your need to practice always like you’re barely human, and maybe you aren’t human

Hiding with her

Because you’re not who I’m supposed to love

And if true love lacks jealousy then I must be broken

And maybe this is not true love

Maybe this love is shattered glass that I-you-someone

Keeps breaking

But I love you

I love the way you lean back in that chair, arms tucked behind your head

Like you know everything and nothing and you’re not afraid

The way you’re full of questions but no answers

The way you hardly know pop culture or what any texting abbreviation means Or that you’re so incredibly beautiful, your blonde braids are from a fairytale

I can’t let anyone else find me

I can’t let him look for me

And it is easy to villainize him,

But it is easier to villainize you

Because there you are

And sometimes falling for a smile is the greatest sting

I’m looking at old text messages, pretty banter and perfect grammar

And I could almost swear that there was a spark

Hidden under the guise of being two best friends

Am I crazy?

Because I’m looking at new messages, and it’s dead

And gone

Where has it gone?

I stare out car windows and ask myself

Where has it gone?

I open a refrigerator and ask myself

Where has it gone?

I write poems and ask myself

Where has it gone?

And I could almost swear that you were chasing me

But now I’m spinning around in circles

And I sometimes crash into him

And I sometimes talk to him

And I always love you

And I could almost swear that you were chasing me

But now you’re chasing her

So if I was a witch, you’d find me in a cabin in the woods

Roots spiraling underneath my bare feet

Mushrooms towering above my wispy hair

I would weave a labyrinth

And she’d trip into another girl’s heart

You’d meet me, twigs intertwining with your braided hair,

Above the creek, on the hands of a tree branch

You would see the reflections of my mind in the water

And maybe you would see love

And if you didn’t, I would lose myself among the ghosts

Rambling through ephemeral roses and wishing for a sign and

Finally resting on a cloud

I’d be too far away for your accidental epiphanies

That cause all my friends to elegize me as the sensitive over-thinker I am

And soon, they won’t want to write my elegy

And you won’t either

And maybe he’d be there to cry for me, like he’s supposed to, like he unfortunately wants to, but I’d never see it, because I’d already be gone

If I was a witch, I wouldn’t have fallen for a girl

If I was a witch, I would have fallen for him instead

If I was a witch, none of this would have happened

#poetry #original poem #queer #lesbian #bisexual #compulsory heterosexuality #reblog this

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kayaland-journal · 1 year

Text

About ‘Redwood’

I remember watching an episode of Braxton Family Values where Toni Braxton, one of my favourite artists ever, was feeling insecure about her music and thinking of retirement because she felt she wasn’t performing at the level she wanted for herself. Her sister Tamar had to come to see her so she could (very animatedly) remind her WHO she is and WHAT she has accomplished. “You are Toni de-Braxton!” And Toni lit up again.

We all need a Tamar.

Sometimes we forget our own power and our strength. We lose hope, we start to despair, life beats us down to a dust and all we need is that one person to tell you - “I believe in you”, “You’re going to be okay”, “You can do this”, “Keep going”, “You’re going to make it”, “You’re stronger than you think”.

And that’s the symbolic meaning behind this poem. Using one of the mightiest species of trees to show that even the greatest amongst us can lose confidence.

Courage is therefore not a parade, it is voice and hands shaking but diving anyway.

#inspo #poetry #motivation #redwood #courage #onthisday #maya angelou

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addamatic · 1 year

Text

To My Friend Who Is Hurting

If I visited you right now

I would not say a word

I would confuse the TSA agents

By filling my suitcase

With soil and dead redwood needles

And chunks of granite

And when we met

I would hand you

A sturdy piece of granite

Straight from the Sierras

But I would not talk

I would not type

I would not say a word

I would find a place

By the side of the road

Full of rocks and debris

I would sit with my legs

Splayed apart like a W

And arrange the rocks

On the sides of my knees

And stack them

In the perfect order

And then I would arrange more rocks

In front of me

And you would be there

And we would start handing rocks

Back and forth to each other

Trusting each other

To put them in the right arrangement

And if any cats came by

We might photograph them

Or sniff their noses

(If they allowed us the courtesy)

And always respect

Their fundamental catness

I would have bought you

A bag of blue marbles

Somewhere along the way

And I would hand you the bag

And look away

As the sky turned to twilight

And perfectly matched

The blue of the marbles

And I would never speak

And I would never type

And I would never say a word

You speak my language

Do you know how rare that is?

For anyone who speaks my language

And does it so well

I would travel to the ends of the earth

With a suitcase full of soil and granite

And spend the whole day

And never have to type

Not a single word

I would stand outside your borders

With rocks in my hands

And you would stand outside my borders

With rocks in your hands

And somehow

The rocks would exchange hands

And somehow

We would build

A sculpture of rocks

In between us

That said everything

That no word

Ever could

If you wanted

I would cover you in rocks

As you lay in the dirt

So that you could feel

The rocks weighting you down

Tying you back to the earth

Under its protection

Away from the things

That are hurting you

But only if you wanted

These are the languages I know how to speak best:

I speak Rock

I speak Tree

I speak Redwood Sorrel

I speak Soil

I speak Lichen

I speak Moss

I speak Dirt

I speak Mud

I speak Water-and-Earth

I speak Creek

I speak Fire

I speak Autistic (some dialects)

I will speak any of these languages

And more that I have not named

If any of them

Will make you feel better

I may not always be a good friend

I may not always remember you exist

I may go months forgetting about you

But when I remember

I will do anything

If it will make you feel better

What I lack in memory

I make up for in loyalty and love

I can’t guarantee that I will always be there

But I can guarantee that when I am there

I will be there — all the way there

And I will be there for you

To the best of my ability

Because that is what being a friend is about

And I will not speak

I will not type

I will not utter a single word

Through a keyboard

Or a PECS symbol

Or anything else

You don’t need more words right now

You need experiences

You need ties to the sensory world

You need rocks, lots of rocks

You need friends who don’t condescend

You need to see cats

You need people who speak your language

We can hand each other rocks

I can help you arrange them

In a style that blends both of ours

And shows

To anyone with eyes to see

(Which is almost nobody, mind you)

That we are friends

That we have collaborated

That the work is a blend of both of us

And that is our language

For any bystanders

Who may be confused

Reading a poem

About the language of rocks

As spoken by Two autistic people

Each rock that we arrange

Has a place, and a meaning

We know these rocks inside out W

e know where the rocks want to be

And we put them there

It becomes a collaboration

Between you

Between me

Between the rocks

Between the ground

And in the end

It is more than it was

In the beginning

After we are gone from that place

Some people will see a bunch of rocks

Some people will see art

Some people will see sculpture

A very few people will see

Two friends

Collaborating with rocks and the earth

To show all the connections

We can’t show to others

If they don’t speak Rock

And I would not speak

And I would not type

And I would not use picture symbols

And I would not use sign language

And I would not use words

And I would not use ideas

But exchanging rocks

And making rock piles

Would tell us each

More about the other Than any words

But I can’t fly

And I don’t have enough granite

For my suitcase

And all of this

Is just a dream

Of what I would do for you

If I could

So I have to type

I have to paint a picture Using words

To show you what I would do

If I only could

To show you that I care

About your happiness

To show you that

I can speak Autispeak

When I need to

And most of all

To give you a break

From all that is harming you

So that when you face it again

You will face it with renewed energy

Renewed resolve

To face it in whatever way you want to

Not just the way they corral you in

I would give you lapis lazuli

And tiger’s eye

And black tourmaline

And moss agate

And amber

And granite

Rocks in your pocket

And rocks in your hand

Will tell you more about

Your place in the world

Than any group of people

Will ever be able to tell you

Rocks in your pocket

And rocks in your hand

Will dance with you

And sing to you

In words only you can hear

They will give you strength

That only rocks can give

Remember to listen

Hear them singing

To the rocks in the ground

And the sand that once was rocks

They sing of things

That only rocks know

And when you face the people

Who condescend to you

Even about the rocks

Who see you as an adult-size child

The rocks in the pocket

Will weigh you down

So the people can’t push you up

Into the air

Without your permission

I can’t give you rocks

I can’t make rock sculptures with you

I can’t sit in the dirt by the side of the road

And find rocks everyone has forgotten

And stack them in towers on my knees

These are things I can’t do with you

But I want to

And that should count for something

I hope it’s enough

Even if just barely enough

For you to know

I want to do these things

I want to speak our mutual autistic languages

I want to leave words behind

Just for a time

I want to show you

What can be possible

And that is what I would do

If I could do it

But maybe just writing about it

Will have to be enough

And most of all I want to create a sanctuary

Where you don’t have to talk

Unless you want

And you don’t have to let anyone in

Unless you want

And you can take the love of our friendship

Back out into the world

With the rocks in your pockets

And the rocks in your hands

And know that the rocks

Will love you

And protect you

In the way only rocks know how

Mel Baggs

#actuallyautistic #actually autistic #mel baggs

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carlos-in-glasses · 1 year

Text

10 Things for 2023

Tagged by @cinnaluminum - thank you! I have no idea who to tag and I’m shy so please just take me as this tagging you if you see this and want to do it :)

My answers are under the cut beneath this Tarlos screenshot I edited for my hereby linked fic.

A fic idea you want to write (or read): I have an idea for a Tarlos honeymoon fic and a fluff fic (both are newly developing in my head) and I want to keep digging into Carlos and his relationship with his dad and his teen-self coming out. A crossover fic where TK and Carlos meet Captain Holt and Kevin from Brooklyn 99 appeals to me greatly but I don’t feel confident about writing Holt – I’m not funny enough! – but I’d like to try at some point as it would certainly push me creatively. It might be a huge flop but shall I give it a go? Eeeeehhhhahhahj I don’t know.

A place you want to go: The Pacific Northwest – I want to see redwoods**. My dream is for a walking holiday somewhere rainy and green. I’d also love to go back to NYC and do all the things I didn’t get to do when I went before. Greece for a beach holiday. Iceland looks stunning. Galway in Ireland and a ferry to Aran, where I’d buy an Aran knit from a little old lady who has perfected the honeycomb stitch. I’ve never been to Paris or Amsterdam. I’d also like to see cities in Belgium. But it’s all such a faff now. Bloody Brexit! I’d love to do a tour of the Scandinavian countries.

A book you want to read: The Overstory by Richard Powers (** I love trees).

Something fun you want to do: An old school boozy brunch with my sluttiest friends – I’ve hardly done this since covid. But really the thing I’m finding most fun is writing Tarlos fic and spending time on my Tarlos-centric side tumblr, so I just want to keep this up!

Something you want to make: I wish I had a talent for textiles and could knit my own jumpers – I have a vast collection of cosy jumpers and a homemade one would be so satisfying.

A habit you want to start: I’d like to do a Rafa and drink more water instead of just buckets of tea. Also is it possible to get into the habit of being less shy?

Something new you want to try: New recipes (that are quick to make and nutritious). I tend to stick to the same dishes.

Something you want to finish from 2022: I feel like I’ve lost the momentum of sending poems to literary journals so I need to pick up where I left off with that.

Something you want to stop doing: Thanks to an abusive boss I had a few years ago (and I don’t use the term abusive lightly) I have a complex where I think I’m the only person who makes mistakes/ I’m deeply stupid. I’d like to stop thinking that way and develop a healthier mindset around being a flawed human being. Like, I might be a huge dumbass but at least I’m not evil. That kind of thing.

Something you want to keep doing: Writing, exercising, going for nature walks, visiting art galleries, going to the cinema – the quiet things that benefit me most mind and body.

#10 things for 2023 #Tag #My answers

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aibidil · 2 years

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Ray Bradbury, “Dusk in the Robot Museums: The Rebirth of the Imagination,” 1980

For some ten years now, I have been writing a long narrative poem about a small boy in the near future who runs into an audio-animatronic museum, veers away from the right portico marked Rome, passes a door marked Alexandria, and enters across a sill where a sign lettered Greece points in across a meadow.

The boy runs over the artificial grass and comes upon Plato, Socrates and perhaps Euripides seated at high noon under an olive tree sipping wine and eating bread and honey and speaking truths.

The boy hesitates and then addresses Plato:

"How goes it with the Republic?"

"Sit down, boy," says Plato, "and I'll tell you."

The boy sits. Plato tells. Socrates steps in from time to time. Euripides does a scene from one of his plays.

Along the way, the boy might well ask a question which hovered in all of our minds the past few decades:

"How come the United States, the country of Ideas on the March, for so long neglected fantasy and science fiction? Why is it that only during the past thirty years attention is being paid?"

Another question from the boy might well be:

"Who is responsible for the change?

"Who has taught the teachers and the librarians to pull up their socks, sit straight, and take notice?

"Simultaneously, which group in our country has backed off from abstraction and moved art back in the direction of pure illustration?"

Since I am neither dead nor a robot, and Plato-as-audioanimatronic lecturer might not be programmed to respond, let me answer as best I can.

The answer is: the students. The young people. The children.

They have led the revolution in reading and painting.

For the first time in the history of art and teaching, the children have become the teachers. Before our time, knowledge came down from the top of the pyramid to the broad base where the students survived as best they could. The gods spoke and the children listened.

But, lo! gravity reverses itself. The massive pyramid turns like a melting iceberg, until the boys and girls are on top. The base of the pyramid now teaches.

How did it happen? After all, back in the twenties and thirties, there were no science-fiction books in the curricula of schools anywhere. There were few in the libraries. Only once or twice a year did a responsible publisher dare to publish one or two books which could be designated as speculative fiction.

If you went into the average library as you motored across America in 1932, 1945, or 1953 you would have found:

No Edgar Rice Burroughs.

No L. Frank Baum and no Oz.

In 1958 or 1962 you would have found no Asimov, no Heinlein, no Van Vogt, and, er, no Bradbury.

Here and there, perhaps one book or two by the above. For the rest: a desert.

What were the reasons for this?

Among librarians and teachers there was then, and there still somewhat dimly persists, an idea, a notion, a concept that only Fact should be eaten with your Wheaties. Fantasy? That's for the Fire Birds. Fantasy, even when it takes science-fictional forms, which it often does, is dangerous. It is escapist. It is daydreaming. It has nothing to do with the world and the world's problems.

So said the snobs who did not know themselves as snobs.

So the shelves lay empty, the books untouched in publishers' bins, the subject untaught.

Comes the Evolution. The survival of that species called Child. The children, dying of starvation, hungry for ideas which lay all about in this fabulous land, locked into machines and architecture, struck out on their own. What did they do?

They walked into classrooms in Waukesha and Peoria and Neepawa and Cheyenne and Moose Jaw and Redwood City and placed a gentle bomb on teacher's desk. Instead of an apple it was Asimov.

"What's that?" the teacher asked, suspiciously.

"Try it. It's good for you," said the students.

"No thanks."

"Try it," said the students. "Read the first page. If you don't like it, stop." And the clever students turned and went away.

The teachers (and the librarians, later) put off reading, kept the book around the house for a few weeks and then, late one night, tried the first paragraph.

And the bomb exploded.

They not only read the first but the second paragraph, the second and third pages, the fourth and fifth chapters.

"My God!" they cried, almost in unison, "these damned books are about something!"

"Good Lord!" they cried, reading a second book, "there are Ideas here!"

"Holy Smoke!" they babbled, on their way through Clarke, heading into Heinlein, emerging from Sturgeon, "these books are-ugly word-relevant!"

"Yes!" shouted the chorus of kids starving in the yard. "Oh, my, yes!"

And the teachers began to teach, and discovered an amazing thing: Students who had never wanted to read before suddenly were galvanized, pulled up their socks, and began to read and quote Ursula Le Guin. Kids who had never read so much as one pirate's obituary in their lives were suddenly turning pages with their tongues, ravening for more.

Librarians were stunned to find that science-fiction books were not only being borrowed in the tens of thousands, but stolen and never returned!

"Where have we been?" the librarians and the teachers asked each other, as the Prince kissed them awake. "What's in these books that makes them as irresistible as Cracker Jack?"

The History of Ideas.

The children wouldn't have said it in so many words. They only sensed it and read it and loved it. The kids sensed, if they could not speak it, that the first science-fiction writers were cavemen who were trying to figure out the first sciences-which were what? How to capture fire. What to do about that lout of a mammoth hanging around outside the cave. How to play dentist to the sabre-tooth tiger and turn him into a house-cat.

Pondering those problems and possible sciences, the first cavemen and women drew science-fiction dreams on the cave walls. Scribbles in soot blueprinting possible strategies. Illustrations of mammoths, tigers, fires: how to solve? How to turn sciencefiction (problem solving) into science-fact (problem solved).

Some few brave ones ran out of the cave to be stomped by the mammoth, toothed by the tiger, scorched by the bestial fire that lived on trees and devoured wood. Some few finally returned to draw on the walls the triumph of the mammoth knocked like a hairy cathedral to earth, the tiger toothless, and the fire tamed and brought within the cave to light their nightmares and warm their souls.

The children sensed, if they could not speak, that the entire history of mankind is problem solving, or science fiction swallowing ideas, digesting them, and excreting formulas for survival. You can't have one without the other. No fantasy, no reality. No studies concerning loss, no gain. No imagination, no will. No impossible dreams: No possible solutions.

The children sensed, if they could not say, that fantasy, and its robot child science fiction, is not escape at all. But a circling round of reality to enchant it and make it behave. What is an airplane, after all, but a circling of reality, an approach to gravity which says: Look, with my magic machine, I defy you. Gravity be gone. Distance, stand aside. Time, stand still, or reverse, as I finally outrace the sun around the world in, by God! look! plane/jet/rocket—80 minutes!

The children guessed, if they did not whisper it, that all science fiction is an attempt to solve problems by pretending to look the other way.

In another place I have described this literary process as Perseus confronted by Medusa. Gazing at Medusa's image in his bronze shield, pretending to look one way, Perseus reaches back over his shoulder and severs Medusa's head. So science fiction pretends at futures in order to cure sick dogs lying in today's road. Indirection is everything. Metaphor is the medicine.

Children love cataphracts, though do not name them thusly. A cataphract is only a special Persian on a specially bred horse, the combination of which threw back the Roman legions some long while ago. Problem solving. Problem: massive Roman armies on foot. Science fiction dreams: cataphract/man-on-horseback. Romans dispersed. Problem solved. Science fiction becomes scientific fact.

Problem: botulism. Science fiction dreams: to someday produce a container which would preserve food, prevent death. Science-fictional dreamers: Napoleon and his technicians. Dream become fact: the invention of the Tin Can. Outcome: millions alive today who would have otherwise writhed and died.

So, it seems, we are all science-fictional children dreaming ourselves into new ways of survival. We are the reliquaries of all time. Instead of putting saints' bones by in crystal and gold jars, to be touched by the faithful in the following centuries, we put by voices and faces, dreams and impossible dreams on tape, on records, in books, on tv, in films. Man the problem solver is that only because he is the Idea Keeper. Only by finding technological ways to save time, keep time, learn from time, and grow into solutions, have we survived into and through this age toward even better ones. Are we polluted? We can unpollute ourselves. Are we crowded? We can de-mob ourselves. Are we alone? Are we sick? The hospitals of the world are better places since TV came to visit, hold hands, take away half the curse of illness and isolation.

Do we want the stars? We can have them. Can we borrow cups of fire from the sun? We can and must and light the world.

Everywhere we look: problems. Everywhere we further deeply look: solutions. The children of men, the children of time, how can they not be fascinated with these challenges? Thus: science fiction and its recent history.

On top of which, as mentioned earlier on, the young people have tossed bombs into your nearest corner art gallery, your downtown art museum.

They have walked through the halls and dozed off at the modern scene as represented by sixty-odd years of abstraction super-abstracting itself until it vanished up its own backside. Empty canvases. Empty minds. No concepts. Sometimes no color. No ideas that would interest a performing flea at a dog circus.

"Enough!" cried the children. "Let there be fantasy. Let there be science-fiction light." Let illustration be reborn.

Let the Pre-Raphaelites re-clone themselves and proliferate!

And it was so.

And because the children of the Space Age, and the sons and daughters of Tolkien wanted their fictional dreams sketched and painted in illustrative terms, the ancient art of story-telling, as acted out by your caveman or your Fra Angelico or your Dante Gabriel Rossetti was reinvented as yet the second giant pyramid turned end for end, and education ran from the base into the apex, and the old order was reversed.

Hence your Double Revolution in reading, in teaching Literature and pictorial Art.

Hence, by osmosis, the Industrial Revolution and the Electronic and Space Ages have finally seeped into the blood, bone, marrow, heart, flesh and mind of the young, who as teachers teach us what we should have known all along.

That Truth again: the History of Ideas, which is all that science fiction ever has been. Ideas birthing themselves into fact, dying, only to reinvent new dreams and ideas to be reborn in yet more fascinating shapes and forms, some of them permanent, all of them promising Survival.

I hope we will not get too serious here, for seriousness is the Red Death if we let it move too freely amongst us. Its freedom is our prison and our defeat and death. A good idea should worry us like a dog. We should not, in turn, worry it into the grave, smother it with intellect, pontificate it into snoozing, kill it with the death of a thousand analytical slices.

Let us remain childlike and not childish in our 20-20 vision, borrowing such telescopes, rockets, or magic carpets as may be needed to hurry us along to miracles of physics as well as dream.

The Double Revolution continues. And there are more, invisible, revolutions to come. There will always be problems. Thank God for that. And solutions. Thank God for that. And tomorrow mornings in which to seek them. Praise Allah and fill the libraries and art galleries of the world with Martians, elves, goblins, astronauts, and librarians and teachers on Alpha Centauri who are busy telling the kids not to read science fiction or fantasy: "It'll turn your brains to mush!"

"Go, children. Run and read. Read and run. Show and tell. Spin another pyramid on its nose. Turn another world upsidedown. Knock the soot off my brain. Repaint the Sistine Chapel inside my skull. Laugh and think. Dream and learn and build."

"Run, boys! Run, girls! Run!"

And with such good advice, the kids will run.

And the Republic will be saved.

#ray bradbury #dusk in the robot museums #science fiction #genre vs literature #fantasy #sci fi #sci fi fantasy #essay

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finishinglinepress · 2 years

Text

NEW FROM FINISHING LINE PRESS: We Who Dream by Gwynn O’Gara

PREORDER NOW: https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/we-who-dream-by-gwynn-ogara/

We Who Dream celebrates love and sex, and looks to the medicine of the natural world to deal with grief and heartache. In O’Gara’s vision the landscapes of Northern California and Mexico become instruments of desire, and strong and giving women answer calls for justice. We Who Dreamtakes us on the journey of making new life, guided by the ancient ones who lead us through danger as we dream our future.

Gwynn O’Gara is a Northern California poet with roots in the natural world, Beat poetry, and her early years in Mexico. O’Gara found her voice performing in San Francisco’s North Beach, and her first book, Snake Woman Poems, was celebrated at City Lights Bookstore in 1983. Gwynn was honored to serve as Sonoma County Poet Laureate from 2010-2011. As a California Poet in the Schools, she explored the joys and mysteries of written and recited poetry with children, teens and adults. Published in Calyx, Paddlefish, and The Comstock Review, O’Gara’s work also appears in anthologies, including Beatitude Silver and Gold editions; Sisters Born, Sisters Found, and Pillow, Exploring the Heart of Eros. Her chapbooks include Fixer-Upper, Winter at Green Haven, and Sea Cradles. She makes her home under redwoods and fruit trees.

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR We Who Dream by Gwynn O’Gara

At once as “amorous as the dawn” with her “salty, sweet” breath, We Who Dream by Gwynn O’Gara carries the rhythms of love. From the poem “Love Crazed” in which the persona reveals, “you always were a fool about men” to “The Pharaoh’s Daughter,” who confesses, “my only weakness—love,” this is a wonderfully cohesive book of poetry delving into the excesses, joys, and dream-qualities of love and sex/ sex and love. In “The Tent Door Opens and Closes,” the poet offers, “the dark/ vine of a man washes me with pomegranate and aloe,” then leaves us in the dream, wanting yet another in “We Who Dream” with the lines, “Reborn in dream-water/ lovers cradle one another.”

We Who Dream transports us through an unconventional eroticism layered in esotericism but always fertile: “Egos/ entwined at our feet, I dream the first night.” The book is, indeed, a “home-run moon.”

–Nancy Dafoe, author of Innermost Sea, novella Naimah and Ajmal, and memoir Unstuck in Time.

The poems in We Who Dream strike so many deep chords—intimate, sexual, environmental, mythical, visionary. Gwynn O’Gara’s gift is the unexpected. There are lines that transport the reader to the threshold of the familiar, inspiring visions of what’s possible just beyond; others pirouette on that edge, opening to an utterly different reality. Mating harbor seals become sleeping beauties; a clam slowly unfolds into “secret, stranger, lover, moon.” Ultimately, these poems kindle a connection, take us to our human core where, like paper cranes, we are threaded each to each by miracles, by incantation, by dreams.

–Terry Ehret, author of Lucky Break and Night Sky Journey

Please share/repost #flpauthor #preorder #AwesomeCoverArt #read #poems #literature #poetry

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justhannigramfics · 2 years

Note

Oh- also 40. Because I wanna see your poems- as you have often seen mine~

*sigh* Alright. You know I'm nervous about my poems, but I'll find one for you I'm somewhat proud of. Hopefully one I haven't already shown you, too.

---

I thought of you when I saw the redwood,

reminding me of the days you were here.

The cabinet seemed to hold secrets

just like the ones you asked me to bear.

The color struck memories of blood and earth,

where together we killed for our rebirth.

The redwood seems stained

with the lies from your lips,

like black moonlight and horrors that came from all this

The door doesn't open.

I haven't tried.

It doesn't seem right

to expose what it hides.

#I wrote this in highschool #so I'm under no illusion it's very good #but it's not the worst one I've ever written either #so there's that

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smorgasbordinvitation · 8 months

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Smorgasbord Book Promotions - Book Review - #Poetry - Ever So Gently: A Collection of Poems by Lauren Scott

Delighted to share my review for recent release by Lauren Scott…Ever So Gently: A Collection of Poems with one of the early reviews. About the collection In Ever So Gently, Lauren Scott shares her strong link to nature, taking the reader on a tranquil walk through a redwood grove. You’ll find an invitation to sit quietly on a patio, captivated by the simple beauty of a hummingbird. She’ll entice…

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#Poetry - Ever So Gently: A Collection of Poems by Lauren Scott

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nahhhlina · 11 months

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Two more weeks until Toska!

Preorder here. (Or yr book retailer of choice.)

Here are some very nice things that writers I admire have said about it:

#alina pleskova #poetry #poems #lit #deep vellum

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