The news of Harvey Weinstein’s actions and those who supported him are both triggering and unsurprising. Like many women and femmes, I turn to expression as a safe space– not to be misunderstood as escapism, but of confronting violence and oppression on my own terms. Taking care of ourselves is important. So is supporting those who are fighting against sexual assault. If you have the resources, please take a moment to learn more about INCITE!, a nation-wide network of radical feminists of color working to end violence against women, gender non-conforming, and trans people of color, and our communities, and donate here.
Here’s some of what I’ve been reading this week:
Poetry
UNDER THE BED IS ANOTHER COUNTRY: gringo death coloring book by Raquel Salas Rivera (print version coming in 2018): “color this in without color: / this is what we do. / we, the monster that you kill in your sleep. / may we survive another night, in the shadows.”
Still Life with Hemorrhage by Leila Chatti in The Massachusetts Review: “Her arms cast out // as if preparing to fly / or as if pinned, savior // or specimen.”
Dress Like Pocahontas, Then Let’s Make Love by Kenzie Allen in DIALOGIST: “You are trying to say your own name, / but can’t pronounce it; you are afraid your skin is turning /
translucent. Wear bronzer. Go on and braid your hair.”
Hablemos entonces de cuán solos/ Let’s talk about solitude then by Kenneth Cumba García (Traducidos por/Translated by Raquel Salas Rivera y/and Kenneth Cumba): “Paradise is also / without dramatic effects / without any urgent looking fruit”
One Poem by Layli Long Soldier in Mud City Journal: “Everything is in the language we use. / For example, a treaty is, essentially, a contract between two sovereign nations.”
Poetry by Scherezade Siobhan in Fog City: “next to me three middle-aged mexican students memorize the newest / echelons of the periodic table. ask me to pronounce / radioactive. i whisper : stepfather.”
WE ARE TURNING GOLD / WE ARE DYING by Kailey Tedesco in Occulum: “i asked / if it was the cistern // or the girl that / was not human & you // looked quiet.”
Essays
Zora Neale Hurston, Diaspora, and the Memory of Hurricanes, by Janell Hobson: “In other words, whether we look to the literary role of Hurston-as-Oya or the political symbol of black womanhood and their precarity, what would it mean to locate a “Black Atlantic” or “Diaspora” not on solid ground or even the expansive Atlantic, but within the stormy winds?”
Unapologetically Stepping In: Lynn Melnick’s Landscape with Sex and Violence, by Rosebud Ben-Oni, addressing both the book itself and the backlash it has received for its unapologetic confrontations of gender-based violence
