“Nobody can beat you to the things only you can write.” — @elizmccrack.bsky.social

And…TikTok went dark. :(

Forest Avenue Press is opening for novel submissions in January! No agent required. Link to details in comments. #callforsubmissions #novelsubmissions #amwritingfiction #amwriting #ampublishing #writingcommunity

Luna says hi ::::

The most effective editing move is still the one I stole from George Saunders: read your draft over and over and over again, out loud, until you have to fix the bad parts because you will literally die if you have to read them more time

I fear I can only jingle some of the way

You should try blaring classical music in your AirPods while doing errands. I’m suddenly the tortured yet peaceful star of my own film!

Quick, let’s get married before they ban 🏳️‍🌈 marriage again ::::

I think my dream day job is owning a laundromat where I have a small desk where I write books to the dulcet tones of sudsy sloshes and dryers humming.

I needed to hear this. Maybe you do too. (And if you haven’t read any of Alice’s work, fix that. It’s phenomenal.)

To everyone who is wondering if the book you’re writing has worth: remember all the books that saved your life and know that someone, somewhere is waiting to read the book that only you can write. Keep going ::::

Writerly reminder that your art doesn’t need to directly address politics to be political. Beauty is political. Love is political. Tenderness is political. 🏳️‍🌈

Great starter list from @thebookmaven.bsky.social #poets #writers

anyway I don't believe in failed drafts, you don't call every stroke that carries you to the shore drowning do you

I love a poem with couplets that have wild second lines. Give me "Everyday he ate the same breakfast: / fourteen love letters folded into paper airplanes" alllllll day. Business in the front, fantasy in the back. Little poetry mullets. Tiny tugboats dragging leviathans into the harbor.

Anyone else text themselves “write poem about [ ]” with alarming frequency? 🤣

Seriously!

Here’s the thing—feeling sorrow and fighting are not the binary. We can, and should, do both. “There must be those among whom we can sit down and weep and still be counted as warriors.” —Adrienne Rich

Maybe I’m a nerd but even with three books under my belt I still get fizzy when I see “[insert famous author’s name] followed you back.”

“Another air raid alert As if they are walking the whole country to the execution But shoot just one of us” --Victoria Amelina, Ukrainian poet who died from wounds inflicted by the Russian bombardment

Devastating ::::

This week on Breaking Form, we're revisiting the work of Louise Glück. You can listen to the episode online at breakingformpod.buzzsprout.com, or wherever you go wild, Iris.

Well, over on threads I had a viral thread taken down for hate speech. The hate speech? Saying Sacramento is “super gay” with a bunch of rainbow emojis 🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈

With extra fire sauce

If civil war breaks out, meet me at the lesbian bar.

Division, mother of pain, Look at you bringing Your children up just as formerly And look at me back again In this former life, You’ve all grown but I haven’t. - W. S. Merwin, "From A Series"

And her light stretches over salt sea :::: —Sappho

Who made the wild and weird lesbians starter pack? Somebody connect me! 🏳️‍🌈💖🧡💖

resolved: people who insist that all social media sites must be places where users are constantly encountering and arguing with people over fundamental disagreement do so because their actual, real lives are echo chambers where they do not encounter any meaningful difference from day-to-day.

Will tacos heal me? WILL THEY?

A few poems that were published earlier this year in Iterant— for those who like Beckett, Canetti, or asterisks. 🖤 iterant.org/issue13/alin...

Finger Exercises for Poets by Dorianne Laux is great. Highly recommend it. Have I been able to write any of the prompts yet? No. Am I thoroughly enjoying the poems she's juxtaposing in each chapter and the pithy commentary? Absolutely. You should get a copy.

Patrick Rosal sings the praises of Jessica Hagedorn’s revolutionary Dogeaters: “I mean to say, the book is haunted. Phantasms inhabit every chapter.”

Confession:::: I love the Oxford comma, but I’m IN LOVE with the em dash — 💖

The world is burning. Who needs some lesbian love poems? 💖🧡💖

Is there a 🏳️‍🌈 writer starter pack? Also, every time I say starter pack I think of Wacky Packs and get a craving for a sheet of chalky bubble gum ::::

Earnest post, but: a thing I like here is it’s okay to have moments of happiness in public without being broadly scolded, and I believe that sustaining this kind of humanity will be very important as we resist fascism. We have to sustain each other. Making joy isn’t denial, it’s how we will survive

This is an essay on my poem "Ballad," Keats's notion of Negative Capability, and Lorca's Duende, with a prompt and a link to the original poem. I'm happy to share it with you.

💖🧡💖

How do I find the lesbian poet and writer starter pack? 💖🧡💖

You’d block someone over politics? Girl, I once blocked someone for disrespecting Mazzy Star. 🌈