cleversimon.com

He looked like a man who would write vers libre, as indeed he did.

[photo]

First (decent) iPhone 4 photo. No processing.

Yeah, I think I’ll keep it.

· 8 notes

[photo]

a softer world: 581

· 12 notes

Civil War, Leigh Stein

I apologize for getting off on danger, but
I can’t tell you any more
about my transitory fantasies involving the two of us
being consumed by prairie fire, because remember
last time? when I said I wanted to take the bones
of your hands and make them into a heart shaped brooch
for my new tweed jacket?

You totally freaked out
and I was just being romantic.

And I’m sorry that
I spent most of last night trying
to crawl inside the spine of my atlas and
I’m also sorry for eskimo kissing the hell out of
the Mason-Dixon line, but globes make
impossible pillows. Pillows make
impossible pillows. I don’t know what to do any more
but ask you to sever and mail me a limb while
I work on memorizing the topography of too far away.

#poetry #for sniffy

· 6 notes

Slow Bridges →

How am I going to tell them? How am I going to tell them I have written a book about me, about us?

As I may have mentioned a time or twelve, my beloved Vivek published a book this year about “growing up as a mom-loving, god-loving, queer Indian boy in Edmonton.” It’s beautifully written, beautifully illustrated, and as I know I’ve mentioned, if you haven’t read it, you’re missing out.

To share something so personal with everyone except with the ones who made me feels like a betrayal. So does the book itself: exposing our family, telling their stories, stories which aren’t mine. “What happens in the home, stays in the home,” my mom would warn us. Which betrayal is worse? Which betrayal weighs more?

I’ve met V’s parents a few times: his dad’s a cool guy and his mom’s a sweetheart. But they’re from an older generation and a conservative religious background, and, you know, you write a book about eyeing up your hunky phys. ed. teacher and how much you love wearing girls’ clothes and it doesn’t matter how cool your parents are, that’s going to be a tough conversation.

Well, they had that conversation.

· 6 notes

Dear god. How did I ever get laid in high school.

Oh, that’s right. I didn’t.

· 13 notes

[photo]

Summer 1999.

I don’t want to talk about it.

#gpoywhatever #shame

· 37 notes

[O]n the rare occasions when the subjects of my pummellings [have] read my articles, they didn’t exactly express gratitude to me for pointing out the holes in their arguments. Nor was the world changed because I’d made fun of an article I’d found in my RSS feed. I had created entertainment; I hadn’t engaged in activism. The most I could hope for was that some real activist had read me and had been inspired to … well, act.

Mockery and derisive laughter are the natural responses of people who feel powerless and pushed around; if there’s nothing else we can do but register our discontent, we should register it. And if we can make the whole ordeal less painful with a few jokes, we should do that, too.

But we shouldn’t mistake the relief it gives us for actual power. If we let it go to our heads, we run the risk of becoming slightly ridiculous. Of becoming pompous, or self-satisfied, or of blithely oversimplifying the issues for our own gain.

Sady Doyle

· 5 notes

[photo]

Mattie finds the greatest pictures. I mean, what.

· via mattie ← greatnorthsea · 75 notes

[photo]

(via sweetchrysanthemum)

· via sweetchrysanthemum · 41 notes

[photo]

Saw the most kickass performance of Macbeth tonight. I haven’t given such a breathless standing ovation in a decade. If you’ll be in or around Edmonton next July—Shakespeare in the Park. Do it.

· 5 notes

Original content © 2007–2010 . Rights & cetera reserved in perpetuam.
Masthead painting by Stanley Donwood. Background photo by Mila Zinkova.