052: Finally, a Relevant Title! Wait I'm running out of r
First, Tha NEWS.
Going off the cuff straight into the ol’ editor today instead of my usual plaintext > copy/paste with no corrections > send workflow. Because there’s something neat I got to do!
Friend of the program Libby Walkup has a newsletter that she does and it’s a nice, calming read of a person and her dog, doing art and living slowly in the Upper Midwest. (You can see that there’s some overlap here already, in the ‘living slow with their dog and doing art’ thing.) What she’s done is allowed me space in said newsletter to be her first guest contributor, where I talk about The Work and how it interweaves with everything. Longtime readers will probably recognize that thread, but I think you should go and check it out here, because there might be something new you pick up on.
Also you should go there because we’re doing a super neat giveaway! There’s a form link in that very newsletter which allows you to sign up for both our newsletters (I mean obviously you already follow me, but I like hers!) and doing so can get you signed up for one of four copies of THE FAILURE EXPERIMENT, which, neat, good book, I like it OR one of four copies of my very first chapbook, Hypersigil.
Hypersigil means a lot to me as it is both a deeply personal poem, intended to be what its title implies, and a wonderful object in and of itself. Libby has training in letterpress and bookbinding, you see, and so while she was in school learning those skills, we hatched a plan, wherein she’d set and assemble books of my poem. I contacted my friend, artist Jessica Wagar, aka Roo, to do the cover art in whatever form she found relevant. The result was an extremely gorgeous book and a successful Kickstarter project. With that project I made the promise to the backers that the poem would never again be printed unless it was in a full Collected Works edition, which has yet to occur.
But then Libby found four extra copies from the original print run! And you could get one! Go sign up!
I want to also just talk about how good a friend and collaborator Libby has been. We’ve known each other for almost thirty years. That’s as many as three tens (almost)! Our orbits always seem to sync at just the right times, and she’s given me a lot of firsts in my career: first published poem (“Overt,” available in confessions from a drainage ditch, was originally printed in the first issue of her journal Ginger Piglet), my first chapbook, my first Kickstarter, and, I guess now my first newsletter exchange! She’s good people. You should really give her words a shot.
In other news, Elle and I did our Q&A… you can check out the online gallery here, with readings by yours truly of four of poems involved in the art. Many of the pieces are still available for sale! You should totally get one.
I started a Threads account, so you can follow me there if you like. I have a rather adversarial relationship with Meta at the moment, so I don’t plan on doing much but crossposting there—you’d be better served by my Bluesky if you’re looking for hot takes, shitposts, and keeping track of how many sex worker posts I like. (Sex work is work and if you’re not on board with that you should maybe reconsider following me and/or my career.)
Second, INTERLUDE.
All this time I thought your name
meant “earth”.
Instead, your name is my name
but older.
We are both prone to madness
and shadow,
cave-ins and strained backs
from lifting our lungs
when no one else could.
(this one’s by me, and excerpt from Hypersigil)
Third, CONSUMPTION.
I have successfully finished one (1) chapter of Jerusalem Vol. 2.
The World’s Largest Trivia Contest is this weekend, and so most of what I’m looking at these days is obscure pop culture trivia. Think about the most useless piece of knowledge you have about movies or books or TV or whatever. Now make that the easiest answer out of approximately 440 questions over the course of 54 straight hours. When I say obscure, I mean obscure. So unfortunately, not much more to report than the above.
Fourth, HUSTLE.
The new hotness is THE FAILURE EXPERIMENT, which you can get here. It’s a serial poem based in Philip K. Dick, JG Ballard, 20th Century cyberpunk, Jack Spicer, and, well, me.
confessions from a drainage ditch was released in late 2023 through Amazon, and is available in ebook and paperback formats. If you haven't picked it up, it's a great introduction to my more concrete and mainstream work.
There’s my chapbook, A Void and Cloudless Sky. By being a subscriber to this newsletter, you're also entitled to a free PDF version, which you can get here. If you want a hard copy, it’s available here.
If you're liking this whole project and want to support it directly, here is my Patreon. There are lots of little benefits you can get there, from poems written to your specifications to subscriber-only limited-edition chapbooks.
Finally, THE OUTRO.
Now’s a weird time. I definitely suggest you start learning who your neighbors are and if you could trust them in an emergency. Start planning for emergencies, especially your emergency kit (aka “bug out bag”) in case you need to intentionally disappear or be elsewhere for a while. Learn how to maintain better opsec than the current US Cabinet. Brush up on all the ways you are being tracked by the Powers That Be. Probably more than anything, take a long, hard look at your morals, ethics, and abilities, and see where you can do the most good now. (I don’t have a link for that one, but I will quote Diane de Prima: “No one way works. It will take all of us shoving at the thing from all sides to bring it down.” What can you do?)
And as one last note, thanks to the ongoing hell we are in, I’m sharing my friend Dextra’s GoFundMe again. Yes, the cancer is gone thanks to an entire -ectomy. But she’s had nothing but mounting costs and medical roadblocks and setbacks since. Help if you can. Please. Even a little. Capitalism sucks and the world is on fire and I want my friend to be okay.