a poem for you!
If you haven’t been receiving Keep Writing, here is the entire exquisite corpse style poem created through postcards and the mail, with a title I provided, 3-10 lines each from Brian Mattarochia, Anis Mojgani and Jenn Marie Nunes, with linking lines provided by subscribers. Each of these writers sent me lines in their handwriting, which I made into a printing plate and letterpress printed. It was started in September with the third installment sent in May. Across those months, I decided to move, changed my address and, like all of you, was ordered to stay home for the health and safety of others. So this surrealist party game has become an adventure.
WE CREATE NOTHING ALONE
I took your picture
with me in my pocket
when i went to the underworld
when I wandered into the woods
in my dreams
and never came back
never emerged from the other side
never came back
never came back out
there was a tiny perfect spider consuming me
and it was you.
You and the rest of your siblings
were gathering somewhere
and I was walking with the tiniest of blueberries
the sun overhead bright as a new tooth
I was missing something in me
not sure if it was what was always had once been in the hole
or if it was now the hole itself
but there was a song
and it was using my body to make itself move to make itself loud
and that which was tiny
was now immense
exhibit A
the system cracking out its
own ribs or
a cat flat on the tarmac
an eruption of flies
and when you name me
the small skin of which
contained me
lets you in.
I’m not going to lie—typing this out is the first time I’ve read it all together, and I am crying. Thank you all for participating. Always for being a part of things.
PS Anis and Jenn both have books of poetry that I can’t recommend enough.
ask a kid
In October, I travelled to the west coast to visit friends. This was way before I decided I would move there. Anyway, it had been awhile and it was good to see so many friends among so many tall trees.
As we are getting older, more of my friends have kids. And more of their kids are no longer babies. I know Pat and Grace from the Bay Area. We met before Aggie was born. I was glad for a few days at their new place in Tacoma with Aggie and Harry, even getting to experience Trunk or Treating with them, showing up in my cameo roll as the weird Aunt at the event at Harry’s school.
At Oly Zine Fest, artnoose told me about her 7 year old. and our host, Kelsey, talked about her kid who is grown now.
As my trip was cut short for work, I chose an old friend in Portland over new letterpress friends (I’ll be back!) because his kid is now 8 and I had not yet met him.
Arlo was 7 3/4 when we met and within an hour we talked about crystals, rocks and what we carry in our pockets. We went to OMSI and he showed me the fish and the lizards too.
I realized that aside from teaching, I don’t spend much time talking with kids. I’ve never wanted kids and though I like teaching, I wasn’t sure I was any good at talking with them. Then what I realized is that you just have to listen. It’s a lot. Kids say a million things in a minute, making connections I can’t keep up with. That’s what’s fun.
I know I have a lot of friends who don’t like kids and I get it. Groups of kids are hard for some people but groups of adults can be hard too. Kids have a range of personalities and I realized that the quiet, focused ones are easy to talk to, well , as easy as anyone else. So I wanted to make a postcard for the kids.
I called Arlo’s dad, Adam, for advice about wording the question I wanted to ask. He checked with Arlo, who said it was a good question. And then Arlo made his own Keep Writing to ask me a question. He mimicked my form, telling a story and then asking a question about the story. It is my favorite fan mail yet.
Adam and Arlo keep chameleons at their place in Portland. If you want to hear about it, you can check out the Chameleon Breeder’s podcast where they talk about kids taking care of chameleons.
from Arlo’s Keep Writing to me
Exquisite!
So you just got the new keep writing in the mail and you’re all, what’s this? Poetry? I did not sign up for poetry.
But then you read it because, why not, it’s there, and the handwriting looks comfortable, like a friend wrote it, and you’re like, ok ok, this isn’t bad.
And then it hits you.
Hi.
I asked my long time friend and writer Brian Mattarochia to participate in an extra experimental Keep Writing. He agreed to write the first 3-10 lines of a poem based on a title I gave him.* Brian and I used to attend weekly poetry readings together in Seattle in the late 90’s. He brought me to my first and only “Lowell Celebrates Kerouac” festival in 1994 where we saw Allen Ginsberg and then participated in a discussion that became part of a documentary called “The Source”**
NOW WHAT you ask? It’s your turn. Tell me the next line of the poem. Mail it to me by December 15. I will choose one and send it to the next writer. I’m not going to tell you who that is. You’ll see. She’s great. Trust me. Her book is on my nightstand now.
And then…we will repeat the process. Until 4 writers plus you plus my title will create a poem, exquisite corpse style, building on one small part of what was already created.
Sound like fun? I thought so. I hope it works.
This is Keep Writing number 127 sent at the end of November 2019, as I prepare to fly to NH for my first Thanksgiving in my home state since…I dunno, since my high school friends would still pick me up at my mom’s house after dinner?
* I told him to interpret the title as he liked—its something I’ve been thinking about lately, about collaboration—WE CREATE NOTHING ALONE—I did not give him any other direction except that I asked he write it in his own handwriting.
**You can find it on YouTube but I’ve included a still of 17 year old Hope for you.
collaborate
I attended St. Louis Small Press Expo in August and made so many good connections that were overshadowed by the numerous swim spots and then sudden decision to buy a camping trailer and become a little more mobile.
I traded a bunch of postcards with Sloppy Queer Press—many of which I sent to friends immediately, but one of them I pinned next to my bed in my makeshift bed/truck bed.
photo from @sloppyqueerpress
HOW DO YOU WANT YOUR WORK TO FEEL?
The question I’ve been asking without the right words. It was what had been in my head all summer, working with kids at summer camp, napping on the studio floor, driving to the expo.
What is most important to me?
What do I need to feel fulfilled?
How does my work relate to the world around me?
And I realized that collaboration and connection is key.
When I reached out to Sloppy Queer Press to ask if I could borrow their inspiration, Zoe Kraus added:
In way of further context, I did write these cards, along with some former colleagues of mine, for a workshop at the Civil Liberties and Public Policy conference last year on building internally-just movements for social justice. The workshop we presented was called Living Our Values: Envisioning New Leadership and Organizing Models in the Sexual & Repro Health, Rights, and Justice Movement. In other words, making sure our work feels to the participants as liberatory as it aims to be for others. And it was deeply influenced by the work of Adrienne Maree Brown, among others, and I will be giving the remainder of those cards away on my instagram as soon as I complete the print run of a quote of Brown's.
Here is Keep Writing number 126, sent in October 2019.
The second in a series of collage turned letterpress postcard. Thanks for working with me. More collaborations ahead.
what have you got to lose?
I struggled with this card. I was trying to design it while also teaching at summer camp which was draining me of all my powers. It never felt right so I put it off and put it off and then there was the threat of a hurricane which luckily mostly seemed like a nap to me. But finally this one made it to the mail box, the July postcard sent August 1 2019.
I had designed something similar for a bookmark for Paper Machine, the print shop in which my printshop is housed. I’d been thinking about my teeth a lot this year. Mixed in with all the other upheaval I was going to the dentist to get my teeth cleaned and partially removed and rehabilitated.
But it all felt like steps forward, facing the problems I had been ignoring because I could. Until I couldn’t.
So here it is. Keep Writing number 123, July 2019, my 42nd birthday.
oh and reading this a month later, I found the typo. Did you?
sleeping troubles
When I was 17 or 18 I had penpals I met through zines. I wrote to people who puts ads in zines, to people who created zines. I am not sure how I met Molly Kalkstein but I have a spring themed mixtape from her from the mid 90’s. I loved her zines, her aesthetic but also the careful observant voice.
We’ve only met twice—once for a few hours when she was an undergrad at Swarthmore. And then about 12 years ago I biked from Burlington to Montreal to stay with her. I got very sick on the way and she was kind. I felt ok by the time I left but I was not a great houseguest, tired and dizzy the first few days. Still, she made us delicious food, took me on a bike adventure, and brought me to a handmade paper mill. I remember she had turned her entry way into a camera obscura. When I got home, two weeks later, still sick and now also suddenly dumped, she sent me a small book made with papers we had bought in Montreal. She suggested maybe we collaborate in someway, introspective women living in french cities.
Finally this spring it happened. I asked her if she wanted to design something for a postcard and she generously agreed. She offered a few Albrecht Durer drawings, I chose one and she wrote the question. It is a good one. I rarely have trouble sleeping ( I might be perpetually over-tired) .
And here it is, Keep Writing number 121, sent in May 2019. Printed in colors chosen to match the desert flower stamps I bought in honor of Molly’s current residence—Tucson, Arizona. Hopefully it isn’t our only collaboration.
your friends are here to help you through
Recently, a grieving friend offered this to another: the world is fucked. life sucks. your friends are here to help you through it.
Which seems pretty grim. Except at that moment, things probably felt pretty grim. In the middle of really tough times, remembering your friends are here, not to change the situation but to help you through it, that’s a powerful realization. And the only comfort that can be offered sometimes.
It’s been a rough year for a lot of people I know. The big changes of this fall—the all or nothing gestures seem borne out enormous loss. Yet, here we are.
Am I using this as an opportunity to write a thank you note to everyone who supported me in the past year. A little. But I want you to share in the appreciation of the people around us who won’t tell you that it isn’t terrible but also won’t leave your side.
This is Keep Writing number 125, sent late September 2019.
post script:
while searching my own name on the internet one night I found this audio recording of a letter to my friend walker. it is part of an audio zine I don’t remember. I don’t know how it ended up here, on youtube. I do remember all the events described, though I had forgotten who was in the house on the night I describe. I am surprised and yet not actually surprised but the similar language in this story and the postcard above, made 14 years apart. I am glad I mention people I still see frequently here. Anyway, here it is:
shared type
I started as a letterpress printer in a basement shop full of type. I might’ve taken for granted the amount of type I had access to. I worked in other shops, was part of a collective with a beautiful type collection but rarely had any of my own. Most of what I print is a monthly postcard. It originated in type but now I mostly use polymet plates, a hardened, recyclable plastic. It isn’t ideal but it is cost-effective.
When Paper Machine was opening, a lot of people who thought letterpress printing had left the city came by to share stories of their dads and granddad’s print shops. Which is how the Gosserand Superior Printers wood type ended up here. Used for years in the production of posters for local jazz shows, this black owned printshop has been out of business for years, but their woodtype was donated to Paper Machine.
Monica Tyran is a New Orleans artist who write a grant to get the type cleaned and sorted so the modern day letterpress printers of the city could use it. And so we did! When I asked her to collaborate with me, we discussed a few ideas but this one was the obvious winner! We choose a few cuts from 3 different drawers. I inked them up in black and printed them on a little sign press here. I scanned the prints and sent them to Monica who designed the card pretty much as you see it. I ordered polymer plates and she came to the shop a few days before I left for summer vacation to see me print them on my windmill.
Mailed the 3rd week of August since the month before was a little late, from the last stop on my swimfest road trip, here is Keep Writing number 124, asking you to tell me about a collection you have.
