FEE FREE 48 HRS 🐑when you get a break from the severed floor, journey to submittable... sotospeak.submittable.com/submit

My very first graphic essay, “Only”—about the complexities of remembering as an only child—is in Blackbird 24.1 🖤 It was a hard one to write and illustrate, but I’m grateful for the process and the processing. TW for suicidal ideation. If you take the time to read and engage with it, thank you 🙏🏼🙏🏽

“If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you." LBJ

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And if the escalator tries to bring you down go crazy

First five min of the Lilith Fair doc and have already cried twice. (Hulu!!)

“Most of the women in my life were at war, and the men around us—even or especially the ones we loved—couldn’t see it, didn’t want to, or worse, cared hardly at all.” Jamie Hood, from Trauma Plot

So very neat to be scrolling through the 2025 @pw.org Guide to MFA Programs and see us! Come write with Venita Blackburn, @stevenchurch.bsky.social, Ra Jarrar, Brynn Saito, Mai Der Vang, & myself at Fresno State, and work on The Normal School! I’m so proud to work where I do ✍🏽

Have Trump supporters been to the grocery store lately? I just got ingredients for a simple chicken verde, which I already have half the ingredients for, and spent $34. No items were organic or cage-free; I bought the cheapest version available of each item. How can anyone afford to live right now?

What’s a book that gets better every time you read it? For me, @melissafebos.bsky.social’s BODY WORK 🤯😭🫠

Brain creases increase the available surface area, like the fins of car radiators, a highly evolved trait which allows us to lie and know we are being lied to, and still be happy, still laugh in our sleep, a flaw that’s not quite a flaw. Dorianne Laux, from “Moonflaw”

Well, this is super exciting news to wake up to 🥳 See you in the new year, Baltimore! #AWP26 @stevieedwardspoet.bsky.social @kaicoggin.bsky.social @janehuffman.bsky.social @christinastoddard.bsky.social

This semester is all grads all the time 📚 Here are the combined booklists for my two MFA seminars, form & theory of CNF and the nonfiction workshop. A few of these I’ve taught before, but mostly I’m bringing lots of new energy. All are fabulous & brilliant, and I can’t wait to dive in ⚡️

Sharing the cover of DEAR MOM, with blurbs from three writers I deeply admire, has me feeling quite a lot. The chapbook is forthcoming from @petrichorlit.bsky.social this fall as part of their digital chapbook series. I'm so lucky to be working with Seth and his team. Read the blurbs on my website!

"Through the erasure of [my mother's] often confessional correspondence to her own parents, I render visible some truths that are difficult for me to speak..." On our site, a visual poem by @brennawomer.bsky.social using collage and erasure of letters to find her own idiom. Link in thread:

Go watch the new South Park episode on Paramount+ like right now.

time's a-ticking #SubmitToday #WritingCommunity #Submissions buff.ly/N5KHIWt

Why sheriff Taylor doesn't carry a gun. Clip from 'The Andy Griffith Show', season 5, episode 23. Broadcast on March 1st, 1965.

Taking care of this poor feral girl for the next week. She went in for spay with a runny eye and came out with it removed—a surprise to us both. They handed me her trap, showed me a picture of a setup, said she needs to be inside, and then basically said figure it out. So figuring it out we are…

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sometimes it seems like people want to get published like it will Solve Their Problems and I just want to confirm that after you publish they don't give you a new childhood, you still have to live with yourself, it's just that some of that self is on display this month at a Review

“Can we go outside and play now?” “Soon, boy.” “You said that ten minutes ago.” “As soon as I finish my cof-“ “Oops.” “You did that on purpose.” “It slipped.” “I’ll get my coat.” “Excellent.”

My neighbor agreed to let me take her two 16-week-old sibling-kittens to be fixed & ear-tipped since they’re outdoor and have started wandering into the neighborhood a bit more with the colony. So, I get to hang out with these cuties, Poncho & Poncha, today! 🖤🩶🤍🤎

Waylon is neutered, ear-tipped, dopey, & in a comfier crate now before release 🐱👂✂️💕 The washable caves for under my porch furniture arrived too, & omg I’m up to $160 in Venmo donations thanks to another badass, cat-loving woman! 🥹🙏🏽 Taking two kitten-siblings (4mo, 1M 1F) to be fixed in the morning!

When I write consistently, I write better. When I write better, I get the urge to look over my pages again in the evening. When I look over my pages, it primes me to wake up the next day knowing what to do and wanting to do it. It’s a virtuous cycle and I’m doing everything I can to keep it going.

Just transported this sweet boy, wailin’ Waylon, my second neighborhood feral, for TNR 🧡 I received $110 in donations yesterday via Venmo (@brenna-womer) from two badass women 🥹 That money will pay to fix 4–5 more feral babes! 🙏🏽 P.s. Merle was released this morning, hissy & pissy as ever 🐱👂🏼✂️💕

Today I got a royalty check for REFUSE TO BE DONE in almost exactly the amount of money I still need to pay this week toward a research trip I’m taking this summer. Thanks so much to everyone who bought my book to help them write theirs, a choice that will also help me write my next one. Good deal!

Trapped my first neighborhood feral for TNR yesterday! Meet Merle 💛 He was hissy & pissy about it, but I would be too. He got a small cut trying to escape, but my bf’s mom, a TNR pro, told me to zip-tie the door in place. Worked like a charm! Next up are Patsy, Waylon, Johnny, & Loretta Lynn 🐱✨

My maracuyá didn’t flower last year, and I felt like I’d failed the vine, like it wasn’t happy enough to flower. I’ve been caring for it extra this spring, and this is the second bloom in three days. I’m so happy it’s happy. (Still working on a better trellis system after the first collapsed!) 💚💜🤍

“The Department of Homeland Security is considering teaming up with a Duck Dynasty producer to create a reality TV show called The American, in which immigrants would compete against each other for a chance to be sworn in as a U.S. citizen.” www.thecut.com/article/kris...

Recent belly blaster I forgot to share! Finished ‘er up a couple weeks ago 🥳 Sooo happy to have that spot over with 🥴

It was an incredible honor to hood our MFA graduates today on stage at Commencement for California State University, Fresno’s College of Arts & Humanities (while wearing what my undergrads affectionately call my “wizard cloak”) 🥹 Be still my heart! ❤️💥

White Castle’s Nottoway Plantation, “one of the nation's oldest remaining Antebellum-era plantation structures, is a ‘total loss’ following a fire, authorities say.”

SUBS CLOSE 11:59pm AND WON'T REOPEN TILL OCTOBER! Get those pieces in you rascals.

The "no adverbs ever" rule I was brought up on in creative writing classes is as dumb as any other blanket statement but it is also true that I can often improve a sentence by simply deleting the adverbs. (But crucially: OFTEN not ALWAYS)

Accidental twinning with my fav barista-friend yesterday 💛💙

Ope!

My chap DEAR MOM was accepted for the @petrichorlit.bsky.social chapbook series 🖤 It’s a hand-collaged epistolary erasure project of letters written by my mom to her parents. Through the erasure, I render visible some truths difficult for me to speak to her. P.s. Querying works—shoot your shot!

It was so disheartening to see my story pop up 😞 Use @theatlantic.com’s tool to check if your writing has been used illegally by Meta to train AI, and see this a response from @authorsguild.bsky.social with info and next steps. www.theatlantic.com/technology/a... authorsguild.org/news/meta-li...

Found copies of @sotospeakjournal.bsky.social 34 in the mailbox today, featuring my essay “Child(free),” about my journey to elective sterilization ✂️✨ I love this mag & the editors I got to work with 🙏🏽 Purchase the $9 hardcopy or $4 digital copy here: sotospeak.submittable.com/submit/25741...

• Behind every estrangement is a child who's had their feelings and concerns invalidated for years, even decades. • Adult children don't walk away from their parents for fun-they walk away because it hurts less than staying.

Don’t mistake an estranged parent’s nostalgia for the control they once had over their child for genuine love and respect.

Someone eavesdropped on the last phone call I had with my parents before we went fully no-contact 👀 @motherwoundproject.bsky.social

I spoke with Benjamin Kirk for Artful Discourse with journalism prof Jesse Scaccia & debate coach Rhiannon Genilla about our experiences working at Valley State Prison and Central California Women’s Facility. The ep is available wherever you do the podcast thing 😊 open.spotify.com/episode/2R4C...

LOL perfection. 70,000 people shouting A MINOR!!!!

Why do white supremacists fake tan?

This book—like my life—emerged weirdly. Had to cancel readings, launch. If you feel able or want to, you can help this little book with a big heart along by sharing? Maybe you know someone who could use a story like this right now. Books find us. www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/726930...

“It’s not your fault what they did to you—men. You’re not the story of those men; you don’t have to live inside their stories. Men don’t even know what it is to be a man yet, or how the story is changing. None of us know much beyond the stories we’ve inherited.” Lidia Yuknavitch, Reading the Waves