It is what it is
But what is it? The case for phoning a friend
Last month, I spent a couple of beautiful weeks in Japan with my mom celebrating some nice milestones. I’ve been to Japan more than I’ve been anywhere, which is only funny because I haven’t been many places, especially outside of America.
I’ve never been to Six Flags because the one time I tried to go to Six Flags, it rained that morning, and though it had stopped by the time we arrived, they didn’t reopen and at the time, their policy was not to offer a new date for the tickets. (In fact, that’s still their policy.) It rained a little and Six Flags stole my money. I saw The Grand Budapest Hotel that day instead.
This is a true story about Six Flags. This is also a true story about America.
Speaking of America, I wrote the following poem last week (and shared it on Instagram and Facebook):
47
What we call ourselves is what we are. But the silkworm
was named by a human, and it’s actually a baby moth.
How does one make sense? A little joke, a thought
unprovoked. Last night, I went to bed in a swing state.
I had hope. My husband said he wished
he could’ve woken me in the night to say she had won.
Sunlight, it’s Americans, not America,
I’m thinking of. The someone I love who traveled
thousands of miles to have an abortion. How
she was given art that now hangs in my bedroom.
Some things are true and still good. But we were taught
to recite the pledge of allegiance in school,
to perform songs about bombs bursting in air.
I was a red-faced show choir kid in black pants,
a clean white shirt, freckled and afraid. What was I for?
Most forced confessions don’t get thrown out. You need
to know, if not understand, in order to live.
Whole people have been meat hooked by history,
by laws written and revoked. We reserved every right,
but they left us polling in our own blood. I vote
for the qualified candidate, but receive the brute instead.
They said to use blue or black pen. They warned us
this could happen again.
Siri, play “In This Together” by Apoptygma Berzerk
I don’t tend to share poems that haven’t been published, let alone poems I wrote that day. (Mainly because most are not winners out of the gate; it takes time and a lot of reminding myself to blink.) But sharing this poem felt like one thing I could do. For me, for anyone who wants it.
I don’t have more to say on all of *this* that’s valuable, except that I’ve been reading. I’ve been watching. I’ve not walked into the ocean and I hope you don’t either. And if you feel like you might, I hope you call a friend. I hope they answer. I hope you go to a bakery together.
Recent Little Happies IRL
Very glad to say that lately I’ve gotten to celebrate some personal wins in the form of great art by even greater people, like H&H’s chapbook series launch at American Grammar here in Philly—featuring wonderful Mary Zhou and their chapbook, cave mouth tongue loose. (You’ll want to follow Mary’s work.) And before she went off on a wild international book tour for Graveyard Shift, I was blessed to celebrate magical M. L. Rio’s book launch at B&N and eat tombstone and gummy worm cupcakes immediately following. I’m going full Dead Poets Society and I don’t care because it’s true: “…poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.” And friendship.
Just this week, I had the privilege of being back at B&N to discuss the ins and outs of memoir (and literal and figurative boxes!) with Athena Dixon, author of The Loneliness Files, and Molly Roden Winter, author of More: A Memoir of Open Marriage. I even curled my hair because I’ve recently taught myself to curl my hair! I’m 34. It’s not too late!
Events, teaching, and some damn fine pre-pub books
On Wednesday, 11/20, at 7:30pm, I’m reading poems at Fergie’s Pub with two fantastic poets and it’ll also be live via Zoom. Register if you want to watch us remotely and show up if you’re in Philly!
Skipping ahead, I’m teaching a weekend-long, live-in-New-Jersey memoir workshop Friday-Monday, 1/17-1/20: The Art of Obsession: A Memoir Workshop. There are still a few spots remaining! Plus, if you book by 11/20, you get $30 off your room package. Mind you, there are many great offerings if you’re not into memoir (or not into it right now) but want a long weekend to yourself and your work with other writers somewhere that’s not your living room.
But wait, there’s more! It’s my honor to be talking to Olivia Campbell live in Doylestown, PA, on Wednesday, 1/22, at 6pm about her incredible new nonfiction book, Sisters in Science: How Four Women Physicists Escaped Nazi Germany and Made Scientific History. Get details, order a signed copy—the whole shebang! I’m just blown away and you will be too. Olivia’s mind! How does she do it! Find out with me.
I will not take you into February+ events and happenings so as to give myself a push to send a newsletter before then. Deal? Deal.
The lie detector determined that was a lie
Because actually, I’m proud to be included in two anthologies publishing next year! My poem “Sometimes I Want to Move to the Suburbs” will be in Best New Poets 2024 (publishing in early 2025, I think?)—thanks to Anders Carlson-Wee and Jeb Livingood—and my essay “In the Direction of Yes” will be in my dear, dear Michele Filgate’s anthology, What My Father and I Don’t Talk About, which comes out on May 6, 2025.
Both of these pieces are unpublished—the latter was written for the anthology—and it’s a surreal honor to share them both with the world soon. “In the Direction of Yes” is a soft epilogue to Disappearing Act only in the sense that, sure, it’s some of what happens later. But in truth, it’s a love story. Shoutout to my husband, and to Craigslist.
Talk about TV shows!
You know I love to talk about TV. Anyone who’s ever told you they don’t own a TV, watch TV, etc. is either lying or deeply unhappy. Am I worse off for having watched two seasons of Love is Blind? Absolutely. But am I better (and are you better) for my having willed a second season of Dark Matter into future existence? Absolutely. (Someone on Instagram was like, but how, the story’s over, and Blake Crouch responded, verbatim: “I say when the story’s over. It’s not over. ;)” Winky face! Power move.)
I love TV because I love stories.
The final season of Somebody Somewhere is tugging at my whole heart and making me want donuts, Bad Sisters is back and I’m salivating without even having watched a trailer (I also singlehandedly manifested this second season too), X-Men '97 had me in its grip immediately (and kept me; I’ll watch a million seasons), and The Penguin crushed me completely. Colin Farrell doesn’t just deserve an Emmy; he deserves seven years of good luck. This goes for Cristin Milioti too. You don’t have to know or appreciate anything Batman to enjoy (“enjoy,” rather, whew) The Penguin, but it helps. I would argue that what you really need to love is The Sopranos.
Last but not least, I haven’t finished Hysteria! yet, but I’m always glad when Garret Dillahunt shows up in any show, though it’s a problem that I root for him no matter what part/side he’s playing. I would join any cult led by that voice, I’m sorry to tell you.
Nonfiction is having a moment (and that moment is the winter of our discontent)
Some forthcoming recommendations from me to you:
I can’t believe I get to interview my agent sibling, Shayne Terry, about her knockout debut memoir, Leave: A Postpartum Account, but I do—I will! Stay tuned for that in early 2025! There is no book like Leave. Equal parts David Sedaris and Sarah Manguso? I think so. Just you wait! (But don’t wait—preorder!* It comes out on February 25th.) Shayne is a voracious, close, generous reader and I take her recommendations to heart. Believe me when I say that, to me, her book is perfect.
Another agent sibling of mine (I’m lucky and biased), Courtney Lund O'Neil, has a debut coming out on December 24th that is also simultaneously one of a kind and universal. Postmortem: What Survives the John Wayne Gacy Murders is a deeply personal book that only Courtney could write. A true crime Christmas preorder that centers the victims, not their killer. Let’s do it!
Fellow Philly writer Kristen Martin has a book coming out on January 21st that almost needs no introduction: The Sun Won’t Come Out Tomorrow. (A+ title, right?) I’m more than willing to let Kristen ruin the twisted fantasy of The Boxcar Children for me if it means sharing the dark truths about real-life American orphanhood with the world. Hello, yes.
*As an aside: A preorder is a great gift to future you and a big gift to the author too! And if you can’t preorder, tell a friend, request it from the library, talk it up publicly… There are several ways to support a debut author, or any author, even if you don’t have the funds to do so directly.
There are so many good books (creative nonfiction and otherwise) coming for us, and these are just a few.
From the writ(h)ing corner
Will it be the teen murder mystery or the high concept dark fantasy for me? Will it be poems of girlhood and grief? The answer is a soft “all three,” which also means it’s time to get back to the work work.
Today and tomorrow: I’m trying to finish revising an unwieldy plot synopsis and the sample pages that go with it. The shadows become clearer, the road becomes a highway. I’m almost there.
But it’s hard to think about the future
I get that. I feel that in my bones. (Tell it to my clicking jaw.)
I worry most about young people, trans people, queer people, people of color, in deep red states. And every time I read or hear a lucky (white) liberal write one of those states off, all I can think is how that flippancy only serves to discount all the people in those states who have to fight harder for the basics—and for our support. All the people who provide access to books and abortions and food pantries and gender-affirming healthcare. The individuals and organizations who risk and sacrifice to give even one person some safety and some dignity, when they look outside and see their live, laugh, love neighbors hanging confederate flags.
I guess I did have more to say.
Wishing you one good thing, and then the next.