This is my first essay for a new Catapult column called Internet as Intimacy: “You’re in Good Virtual Hands: On ASMR, Anxiety, Relaxation in the Side-Hustle Economy, and Being Baby.” Featuring some of my favorite ASMRtists, and one of the best meme-takes by my friend Aiden Arata.
“Bed of Dragonflies” by Claudia Amuedo, courtesy of wearegrimoire.com
NYC POETRY FESTIVAL
I’ve been in New York City for a little over a year now. It’s been a lot, hence some radio silence, but the summer is shaping up magically.
I am reading poems THIS WEEKEND at The New York City Poetry Festival! If you’re in town and feel like taking the ferry to Governor’s Island, you might see me:
Reading with Litbreaker on the Chumley’s stage at 2:00 pm
Selling chapbooks and swag at the Sweet Action merch table at 4:00
Reading with Sweet Action Poetry Collective on the Chumley’s stage at 5:00 pm
Full schedule for the festival is here.
SOFT SKULL AND CATAPULT
In other news, I am now the editorial assistant at Soft Skull Press and get to spend my workdays surrounded by books!! Since last July, I’ve also been soliciting fiction and the occasional essay for Catapult and have published these gems:
“Dusty Secrets and Sleights of Hand” by Crystal Carey
“The Evacuation” by Sarah Blake
“North to the Future” by Luke Wiget
“How to Love a Rabbit” by Nahida S. Nisa
“Marisa, the Pitch Pine” by Joe Wadlington
“On Violations, Macarons, and the Pursuit of Beauty I Can Control” by Maggie Tokuda-Hall
“The Day Nothing Remarkable Happened” by Kamil Ahsan
PUBLICATIONS
My recent and forthcoming publications, since last update:
“Of all the classes of people who ever lived” and “THE FINANCIAL BENEFITS OF CHIVALRY” — erasure poems in the forthcoming anthology Erase the Patriarchy (University of Hell Press), edited by Isobel O’Hare
“Guided Meditation with Inner Mother” — poem at Grimoire
"Temperance" and "Becoming the Magician" — tarot medicine poems at Yes Poetry
"The Empress" and "Poem about My Uterus" — poems at FORTH magazine
IMAGE COURTESY OF BLACKLAWRENCE.COM
IMAGE COURTESY OF SHIPWRECKSF.SIMPLECAST.FM
New York City friends! A little over two weeks from now, I am reading at the book launch party for They Said: A Multi-Genre Anthology of Contemporary Collaborative Writing. It will be held at Shakespeare & Co. on Lexington Avenue, Thursday, July 26th, from 6:30 - 8:00 pm. RSVP on Facebook here, if you feel so inclined.
This was my first time collaborating with a living writer. It's going to be strange to read the poem alone after writing it with Isobel O'Hare. Now it's hard to tell whose lines are whose, whose voice the poem is in, because it feels like something beyond us. I can't wait to see the rest of the collaborations and read how other contributors approached working jointly. You can preorder the book here from Black Lawrence Press.
IMAGE COURTESY OF ALY SCHAEFER
In other news, after a few years of experiencing the literary ribaldry of Shipwreck as an audience member, I participated as a writer for the first time back in February. The gist of Shipwreck is for the writers to wreck good books with humor, satire, and gratuitous sex scenes. (Amy Stephenson and Casey Childers are responsible for this.) The thespian-in-residence, Baruch Porras-Hernandez, reads each story with equal drama (and preserves the anonymity of the writers). The audience gets to drink booze in a bookstore and vote for their favorite story, and someone is crowned a winner.
February's book was Jane Eyre! And the podcast, a recording of the night of the contest, just went up a couple of weeks ago. If you are not related to me and I don't work with your children, I invite you to give a listen to the Jane Eyre episode of the ShipwreckSF podcast here. The text version might be posted eventually. I don't want to spoil too much, but I was crowned smut queen for the evening and invited to participate again.
Hello, friends. It's been a whirlwind couple of months in preparation for my move to New York City! I'll be road-tripping across the U.S. from June 8th - 14th, so orders are temporarily closed for both editions of Inevitable What.
Tarot Medicine Poetry is coming soon! I'll be opening up a few spots in July, when I will have access to all of my decks, stationery, my printer, and a post office again. I'll announce in my newsletter when these spots are opening, so if you haven't yet, you can sign up for announcements here.
In the meantime, you can secure a "Reading from the Road." This is a simple 3-card emailed reading, no poem, to be done along my road trip route. A postcard of sorts. I'm doing one per day for seven days.
Image courtesy of https://www.instagram.com/gottesss/
With all of the moving-related hullabaloo, I missed announcing the preorders window for the current and final volume of Many Moons, a workbook I help to edit. But! As of today, June 4th, you can snag a copy from these stockists:
If that doesn't work, take a look at Sarah Faith Gottesdiener's full stockists list at the bottom of this page. Note that you may need to call these stockists; the books may be in-store only, not available online.
I do not have any copies for sale, unfortunately. Sending you a little magic mojo so that you can track down a copy of your own!
Image courtesy of BlackLawrence.com
Happy National Poetry Month! I am pleased as punch to show you this beautiful-weird new cover for They Said: A Multi-Genre Anthology of Contemporary Collaborative Writing—and more pleased than punch to announce that preorders are now open!!
Poet-friend Isobel O'Hare and I co-wrote a poem that appears in here. You can read about our process in the back of the book once it makes its way to your hot little hands. The full list of contributors, advanced praise (including from the editors of ZYZZYVA—I swooned), and order link are in today's BLP announcement.
Image courtesy of younginklings.org
In other Poetry Month news, Society of Young Inklings interviewed me as their resident poet for their monthly newsletter, the Ink Splat. You can read about me writing poems for online communities as a teen, gushing about Matthew Zapruder, and being inspired by young writers here.