Max Ritvo – my favorite from The Final Voicemails

Every GOP accusation is a confession

this iconic advertising copywriter named Kathy Hepinstall Parks died over the weekend and I wanted to share something from her website I thought Bluesky would like

I did nothing but walk & read this weekend. Walked several miles, exploring the green belt and nearby neighborhoods & then bought 2 books from my local bookstore. The world is a horroshow right now and some days I need just to escape #weekendgoals

"One of the reasons the epidemic of violence against women is so unacknowledged is because cases like these are talked about individually, and often treated as though they are shocking aberrations rather than part of a pervasive pattern that operates at all levels of society."

„Divine previously left little doubt, referr[ed] to abortion providers as killers of “pre-born babies” and railing against insurers for covering what he falsely calls “abortifacients,” like hormonal birth control.“

That demon tried to leap out of him

Today marks 4 years since poet Galal El-Behairy should have been released from prison. Despite finishing an unjust 3-year sentence for his writing in 2021, he remains unlawfully detained in Egypt. Our joint letter urging Egypt’s Ambassador to the U.S. Motaz Zahran to act: pen.org/joint-letter...

New fiction today from Jen Conley. Head over to Reckon to read: "The First True Love of Eddie Callahan" @jenconley45.bsky.social

1. We interrupt this programming for some LEGITIMATELY GOOD NEWS Violent crime in Baltimore has PLUMMETED to historic lows How did the city do it? Baltimore adopted a comprehensive set of "woke" policies, treating violence as a public health issue

THEM: What do you do? ME: I'm a writer. THEM: Have you written anything I might have read? ME: I don't know. What kind of books do you read? THEM: Oh, I don't read. ME: Well, then I guess the answer to your question is no.

We are in the middle of it.

“I love America more than any other country in the world and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually." ~ James Baldwin

Some people are working on gathering at the Capitol steps to show support for Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York. If you can’t be there in person, you can still show your support from wherever you are.

Currently reading BAD COMPANY by Megan Greenwell and it is as good a read as you may have seen or heard. The sections about private equity killing local journalism and news is related---and a through line-–to our public education and public library destabilization and dismantling.

“I think the hardest part about writing is writing." ~ Nora Ephron

The American Academy of Pediatricians bluntly telling us the current CDC can't be trusted, and of course they are absolutely correct publications.aap.org/aapnews/news...

'Who are these people?' Masked immigration agents challenge local police, sow fear in L.A. -- Really good piece from @tarantulaarms.bsky.social & @lacrimes.bsky.social www.latimes.com/california/s...

"The real artistry comes in revision: the writer striving to make everything count. Working the lines over and over to bring the work into shapeliness, while also seeking to make the whole thing seem effortless. As if it was all just breathed out in a sigh." ~ Richard Bausch

Today only poetry can save us. #poetry www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57673/...

Casual cruelty has become the norm on the right. It’s great to see so many on both sides of the aisle calling it out and demanding better. We don’t have to agree but we can and should be kind & civil at the least.

"I’ve learned over the years to free-fall into what’s happening... Things start to happen under your pencil that you don’t want to happen, or don’t understand. But that’s when the work starts to have a beating heart." ~ Andre Dubus III

What the actual hell? www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Thought for the day ... "Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind." ~ George Orwell #NoKings

“When they slaughtered Congress, we didn't wake up. When they blamed terrorists and suspended the constitution, we didn't wake up then, either. Nothing changes instantaneously. In a gradually heating bathtub, you'd be boiled to death before you knew it.” —Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale

BREAKING: A few minutes ago, a vehicle of three people was rammed by a truck belonging to federal immigration authorities in Boyle Heights, CA. According to security footage shown to me, they deployed chemical munitions & detained the driver at gunpoint. All are US citizens according to the wife.

All new @bendinggenres.bsky.social Issue 45 is live and stunning!!! 30 gems from around the world, CNF, poems, and flash fiction. Come read and share your favorites!!! www.bendinggenres.com

“Fascism, it’s always about using nationalism, and the nation, as a bludgeon to generate support for death policies, on behalf of death governments. For violence and repression and exploitation, internationalism is the antidote, always.” —Robin D. G. Kelley

“Serious thoughts need different cultivation and time to grow; plants as seeds of living speech in the ground of an appropriate soul…serious thoughts and knowledge have their real life in philosophical conversation, not in the games of reading and writing” Anne Carson Eros the Bittersweet

#environment Restauring native fauna.

Not me getting emotional this morning at Tobias Wolff’s Introduction to The Best American Short Stories 1994.

"Half the world is composed of people who have something to say and can't, and the other half who have nothing to say and keep on saying it." ~ Robert Frost

Rye grasses on the edge of an empty lawn. This rye likely once covered the entire field. Why do we destroy everything beautiful in the name of progress?

“The president’s solutions-focused approach to legal roadblocks necessitated thinking outside the constitutional box.”

Cake of the night, week, month, year….

Not every book I read has to be a deep literary experience. But when social media celeb references show up on page three into a novel, that’s a hard no thank you.

“Groundwater may be hidden, but scientists know with relative certainty that once it is pumped out, it won’t be able to recharge within our lifetimes. Much of it was deposited tens or hundreds of thousands of years ago.” I’m sure this is fine, right?

I don't feel well. I don't feel up to it. My clothes are too shabby. Besides, I hate people. I'm afraid of people. I never used to be like this, but now I'm going dippy, I suppose.

The Seductive River of Delusion, Dinty W. Moore, ink and watercolor, 2025

Georgia O'Keeffe's stunning portrait of fellow artist Beauford Delaney, from the collection of the National Portrait Gallery npg.si.edu/object/npg_N...

Imagine half of the members the highest authority in the land deciding it will no longer abide by the laws laid out in our most foundational document bc of their own personal beliefs or political leanings. Essentially breaking the rule of law from the very foundation upon which it rests.

Writers, get your submissions ready. Fiction always hits the cap (500) very fast, so don't delay. NF and poetry also have caps (500 & 800, respectively) though they don't typically fill up quite as fast. Don't be boring, that's the main tip

“When I’m writing, I am trying to find out who I am, who we are, what we’re capable of, how we feel, how we lose and stand up, and go on from darkness into darkness.” ~ Maya Angelou

An Indigenous Theory of Water: @biidaasamose.bsky.social on Rivers as Teachers