I. Pre-
I write to you post-peak of the second-worst surge; where one day flirts with 60 degrees and another brings flurries. This first month I’ve been slowly building in steady ritual. I’ve been successfully writing (at least a little) every day, watching a pair of movies each week (hot takes here), and now conceiving this as a monthly newsletter.
II. Post-Long
The Long Poem has been on my mind while preparing for this support group, which will start next week on Zoom and continue every fourth Saturday mornings. (Our Google Group is here and our reading list is on Greenlight here.) Ry and I received quite an overwhelming response—which, maybe, is telling.
The question of “why long” has many answers. For me, long has the potential to counter ever-shortening attention spans and capitalist, ableist impatience towards a more generous, encompassing slow. It seems to have potential to contain the humbling vulnerabilities of mind-changing, of ramble, of discovery. Of course, this mode is not without its contradictions and potential limitations.
I’ve been thinking about the linguistic concept of telicity, measured by how much a verb heads towards a particular endpoint; an aimless action is classified as atelic. Indeed, when does aimlessness and ramble become complacent, or gratuitous—even ego? I wonder this and will continue to in this process.
This year, the Post Post Post might turn into the Long Long Long—at least some months—as a way to share some of my thinking around reading and writing this form. (Think potential entries on “along,” “longing,” “long-haul,” “long-time” etc.) I am often inclined to “write poems about the poems,” which is all well and good, but I think sharing some of my conceptual musing here, in prose, might help to give what becomes the long poem more focus. (“Maybe a wink / here and there // but only a matter of time / before your eyes / hurt from all that / half-closing,” I drafted recently.) I’ll see, and you’ll see too—since this is the space to think about what happens after, after all.
III. Re-Post
“A Normal Thing for a Person to Do” by Sam Herschel Wein, recently published by Chicago Reader, continues to swim in my head as portrait of the moment and as a queer meditation of so-called “seriousness.”
“Countering Hate, Together,” an absolute banger by Juliet Gelfman-Randazo is recently published by Tagvverk. It makes me think about the empty language all around us that refuses the reality of violences and genocide even at their most explicit.
Join us for a special exquisites x Legacy Collective reading on Zoom this Thursday, February 1st featuring Kyle Carrero Lopez, Cyrée Jarelle Johnson, W.J. Lofton, Joselia Rebekah Hughes and KT Pe Benito. Set by yours truly at 6:30 pm, readings at 7 pm by this truly iconic lineup.
Today is the first day of the Global Strike for Palestine, join me in reflecting and taking any actions that are possible to you this week. See below for resources from @sheeekster and Protect Palestine:
With care,
d