Hail Cascadia, full of rage, your sisters in slumber are with thee. Dreadful art thou amongst disasters, and dreadful is the fruit of thy wrath, tsunami. Holy Cascadia, Mother of Mountains, have mercy on us mortal creatures now and at the hour of your waking. Amen.
Dua Tefnut, Great Mother of the Earth and Sky Dua Tefnut, Venerable Eye of Ra, Brightly Burning Dua Tefnut, Lady of Sweet Waters, She Who Brings the Rains Dua Tefnut!
Great mother of the gods, I sing your praises! You bless us with all the waters of the world: the cool morning dew, the damp evening fog the sweet spring rains, the cooling summer storms! From you flow all rivers and springs; with every precious drop of water you bring life to the driest deserts! First daughter of Ra, I sing your praises!
Dua Tefnut, Great Mother of the Earth and Sky Dua Tefnut, Venerable Eye of Ra, Brightly Burning Dua Tefnut, Lady of Sweet Waters, She Who Brings the Rains Dua Tefnut!
I am both Notre Dame and the sacred space which fills her vaulted archways. I am gargoyles and spires and the vibrating silence after the bells have ceased. I am that which cannot be seen, cannot be touched, cannot be proven; I am stone, glass, wax. I am facade and everything it fails to encompass. I am sanctuary.
my body is a nuclear reactor in which I alchemize grief into rage // shedding as hazardous byproducts unstable atoms of // anxiety, compulsion, paranoia // which I store away deep in my belly where they // cannot leak out and harm innocent bystanders // or worse yet, embarrass me // but such transformation requires a complex and delicate machine // and I am only one person // the lights in the monitoring panels start to blink and // I am only one person // the alarms on the walls start to shrill and // I am only one person // an explosion rocks my core and as everything goes dark I am // only one person
sacred revolution holy reclamation defiance of fate and fortitude against death a communion with those who came before a covenant with those who come after a consecration of those who fight and fall beside us
heart still beats ‘neath the floorboards of a house I can’t return to, twenty years and more straining in the damp glacial till that nurtured a blackberry youth, and every night my spirit leaps free my slumbering body to fly ‘cross moonlit miles and reunite like no time at all has passed, what foolish business!, and thus I wake each morning curled ‘round that house-shaped cavity wishing I could say goodbye, wishing I could let that place go, wishing I could move on from a past that keeps moving farther on from me with every passing year
“In this metaphor I am the shattered sword you didn’t need”
I am happy ending intolerant final kisses curdle my stomach burn the back of my throat. I politely excuse myself go sit on the toilet, head thrown back eyes wide so the tears can’t spill.
Did you think you were like them? Did you forget for a moment that this story isn’t for you, either?
Save the cat, kiss the princess, roll credits I am so envious it hurts. Catra the war criminal redeemed and forgiven Carmilla the vampire blessed with a heartbeat I, the asexual, still more monster than them both.
It was easier, ultimately (than the knife and the heart) to pick, pick, pick at her flawless skin (the forest and the hunter) until it bled and scarred bled and scarred (the apple and the coffin) and the mirror simply stopped saying her name.
He does not launder his fine white dress shirt. He does not clean the marble tiles in the bathroom. He does not change the silk bed sheets. He does not touch anything.
The blood is all he has left. He cannot bear to wash it away.
This was a good year for reading – or at least better than 2020! I read a total of 73 books, zines, graphic novels, etc. including: 33 with queer characters or by queer authors; at least 24 with POC main characters or by authors of color; 12 poetry collections; and 16 nonfiction books. I even got through most of my physical TBR pile from the beginning of the year, though it’s grown again thanks to holiday gifts. Guess I better get started on my 2022 list! ;)
So Our Idols Are Dead: Empowerment Poems – K.D. Hume
Between Death and the Devil: Tarot Poems – K.D. Hume
Gramarye, a Witch’s Perzine: Issues 1-4 – K.D. Hume
So Happy to See Cherry Blossoms: Haiku from the Year of the Great Earthquake and Tsunami – Ed. Mayuzumi Madoka
She and Her Cat – Makoto Shinkai and Tsubasa Yamaguchi
The Endless Possibilities of Beatrice – Annie Goodyear
Raven Goddess: Going Deeper with the Morrigan – Morgan Daimler
Goddess of the Hunt – Shelby Eileen
Up from the Sea – Leza Lowitz
Tsunami Vs the Fukushima 50: Poems – Lee Ann Roripaugh
Coffee with Orange Sherbet – S.E. Shell
The Phone Booth in Mr. Hirota’s Garden – Heather Smith and Rachel Wada
I Survived: The Japanese Tsunami, 2011 – Lauren Tarshis
The Warrior Moon – K. R. Arsenault
Beyond Me – Anne Donwerth-Chikamatsu
Hathor: A Reintroduction to an Ancient Egyptian Goddess – Lesley Jackson
The Guest Cat – Takashi Hiraide
Alanna: The First Adventure (The Lioness Quartet Book 1) – Tamora Pierce
In the Hand of the Goddess (The Lioness Quartet Book 2) – Tamora Pierce
The Guilded Ones – Namina Forna
Cemetery Boys – Aiden Thomas
Educated – Tara Westover
Only the Sea Keeps: Poems of the Tsunami – Ed. Judith Robinson, Joan Bauer, Sankar Roy
The Woman Who Rides Like A Man (The Lioness Quartet Book 3) – Tamora Pierce
How Long Til Black Future Month? – N.K Jemesin
Lioness Rampant (The Lioness Quartet Book 4) – Tamora Pierce
Gramarye, a Witch’s Perzine: Issue 5 – K.D. Hume
Gramarye, a Witch’s Perzine: Issue 6 – K.D. Hume
Gramarye, a Witch’s Perzine: Issue 7 – K.D. Hume
Love Songs for the Sun: Poems – KD Hume
This Precious Life: Buddhist Tsunami Relief and Anti-Nuclear Activism in Post 3.11 Japan – Ed. Jonathan S. Watts
First Test (Protector of the Small Book 1) – Tamora Pierce
Page (Protector of the Small Book 2) – Tamora Pierce
Squire (Protector of the Small Book 3) – Tamora Pierce
Lady Knight (Protector of the Small Book 4) – Tamora Pierce
Valor and the Vain: A Fairytale – K. D. Hume
All Night Long: Haiku, Senryu, and Other Short Poems, and a Haibun on the Great Tohoku Earthquake – Kirby Record
Red Skies: A Creators Response to 2020 – Ed. Rachel Small and Amanda Edwards
The Last Girl Scout – Natalie Ironside
Where the Dead Pause and the Japanese Say Goodbye: A Journey – Marie Mutsuki Mockett
A Constellation of Cats – Ed. Denise Little
Where Shadows Lie (Book One of The Last Gift) – Allegra Pescatore
Find Your Goddess – Skye Alexander
I Sexually Identify As An Attack Helicopter – Isabel Falls
The World that Belongs to Us: An Anthology of Queer Poetry from South Asia – Ed. Aditi Angiras & Akhil Katyal
One Year on T: On Non-binary Sex and Transition – Sage Pantony
1.5 Years on T: My Non-binary Body, Transition, and Ambivalence – Sage Pantony
Unspeakable: A Queer Gothic Anthology – Ed. Celine Frohn
Coming Off of T: Transition As Cycle – Sage Pantony
Silk and Steel: A Queer Speculative Adventure Anthology – Ed. Janine Southard
Lead and Roses: Love Songs at the End of the World – Natalie Ironside
Full-Rip 9.0: The Next Big Earthquake in the Pacific Northwest – Sandy Doughton
Wild Magic (The Immortals Quartet Book 1) – Tamora Pierce
Wolf-Speaker (The Immortals Quartet Book 2) – Tamora Pierce
The Cruel Sister – KD Hume
Emperor Mage (The Immortals Quartet Book 3) – Tamora Pierce
The Realms of the Gods (The Immortals Quartet Book 4) – Tamora Pierce
Persons of Consequence – KD Hume
Great Goddesses: Life Lessons from Myths and Monsters – Nikita Gill
And the River Flowed As a Raft of Corpses: The Poetry of Yamaguchi Tsutomu, Survivor of Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki – Chad Diehl
Life Everlasting: The Animal Way of Death – Bernd Heinrich
Non-binary: Memoirs of Gender and Identity – Ed. Micah Rajunov, Scott Duane
Who By Water: Reflections of a Tsunami Psychologist – Ronna Kabatznick
The Luminous Dead – Caitlin Starling
From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death – Caitlin Doughty
Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World’s Greatest Nuclear Disaster – Adam Higginbotham
Warning Lines Magazine Issue 2: Echo – Ed. Charlie D’Aniello
Hellebore Issue #1: The Sacrifice Issue – Ed. Maria J Perez Cuervo
Sorrowland: A Novel – Rivers Solomon
Skin of the Sea – Natasha Bowen
Girls of Fate and Fury (Girls of Paper and Fire Book 3) – Natasha Ngan
The Jaguar Princess – Clare Bell
Fukushima: The Story of a Nuclear Disaster – David Lochbaum and The Union of Concerned Scientists
maybe he stands on the ledge so often (just take my hand, darling)
not so you’ll come stop him from jumping (why don’t you take mine, beloved?)
but so you’ll come give him the opportunity
(his smile a crescent moon)
to push you off
(sharp enough to cut your wrists on)
instead
Odin is dead, Odin is undead Loki is chained, Loki is unchained The World Serpent sheds its skin Bleeds and writhes in death throes Ragnarok approaches Skål! Skål! Skål!
Hail to the animal dead!
Hail to the creatures with which we share this Earth
large and small, domesticated and wild,
livestock and house pet and feral.
You who suffered in cages and feedlots
who struggled to survive in a vanishing wilderness
may death bring merciful freedom
and may your agony be a yoke around our necks
so we might do better by your children.
Hail to the animal dead!
Hail to the ancestral dead! Hail to those ancestors with whom I share blood and to whom I am bound by love. Hail to those ancestors with whom I share identity and experience: queer, pagan, witch, neurodivergent, all of you ostracized for who and what you were. May you find joy in the life your descendant lives; may your hopes come to fruition in me and your memory be honored by my actions. Hail to the ancestral dead!
Hail to the stolen dead! Hail to those of you taken too soon by the evils of capitalism, colonialism, and fascism, by hatred and fear, greed and pride. Those of you stolen from your communities, ground beneath the heel of your oppressors, we vow to uphold your memory to fight against corruption and cruelty in hopes others may not share your fate. Hail to the stolen dead!