Joanna C. Valente is a human who lives in Brooklyn, New York. They are the author of Sirs & Madams, The Gods Are Dead, Marys of the Sea, Sexting Ghosts, Xenos, No(body) (forthcoming, Madhouse Press, 2019), and is the editor of A Shadow Map: Writing by Survivors of Sexual Assault. They received their MFA in writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Joanna is the founder of Yes Poetry and the senior managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine. Some of their writing has appeared in The Rumpus, Them, Brooklyn Magazine, BUST, and elsewhere. Joanna also leads workshops at Brooklyn Poets. joannavalente.com / Twitter: @joannasaid / IG: joannacvalente / FB: joannacvalente
Brandon Amico on Why He Doesn't Want to Be Unreachable
Brandon Amico is a writer whose debut collection of poems, DISAPPEARING, INC., is forthcoming in March 2019 from Gold Wake Press.
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Photo: Joanna C. Valente
Bewitched: When The Velvet Underground Cast an Identity Spell on Me
Stephanie Valente lives in Brooklyn, NY. She has published Hotel Ghost (Bottlecap Press, 2015) and waiting for the end of the world (Bottlecap Press, 2017) and has work included in Susan, TL;DR, and Cosmonauts Avenue. Sometimes, she feels human. http://stephanievalente.com
DIY Gift Ideas for The Magical, the Dreamy, and the Crafty
BY LISA MARIE BASILE
I have never — literally, ever — been crafty (excerpt with journaling — which I do, on a very basic level). When I stepped inside a Michael’s for the first time, I was overwhelmed. It was alien to me.
However, I was tasked with ‘making’ something when I working on my last book, Light Magic for Dark Times. My editor suggested creating something sweet and unique as a way to get people interested in my book.
Creative paralysis. A crafty person does not a writer make!
So, I watched some videos on YouTube, bought a few bits from Etsy, and began creating little spell bags. I used shells (many collected from the beach, some bought), sachet bags, dried roses and lavender, scrolls, and nautical trinkets — and I fell in love with the process. I made hundreds of these for my readers and potential book sellers. (Hint: book promotion is way, way harder than I ever thought it would be — I’ve got an article coming out about that soon).
So, if you like to make things with your hands, create your own gifts or DIY goodies rather than spend money on mass-produced items, or simply surround yourself with intentional and special objects, I’ve rounded up some of the best DIY gift-making videos I watched.
These will help you create dreamy, literary, and magical bits and bobs. Made with intention and care, these little beauties not only make beautiful home decor (or, as I said, gifts) but the process of making something can be meditative and rewarding.
Here we go:
Review of Christine Stoddard's 'Water for the Cactus Woman'
Christine Stoddard’s poetry collection, Water for the Cactus Woman (Spuytenduyvil, 2018) is a meditation on family, the body, and navigating a bi-cultural map of memories. The most looming figure in the poems is the speaker’s dead grandmother, who appears in the most mundane of places, bringing dread to the speaker. In “The Cactus Centerpiece”, the ghost provokes jealousy and a cactus shapeshifts from protective shield to a portal for the dead, “We never named the cactus/ or the petite panther, / even though we named/everything, good or bad.”
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Poetry Weekly: Vanessa Angélica Villarreal, Jessica Morey-Collins, Justin Karcher
Joanna C. Valente is a human who lives in Brooklyn, New York. They are the author of Sirs & Madams, The Gods Are Dead, Marys of the Sea, Sexting Ghosts, Xenos, No(body) (forthcoming, Madhouse Press, 2019), and is the editor of A Shadow Map: Writing by Survivors of Sexual Assault. They received their MFA in writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Joanna is the founder of Yes Poetry and the senior managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine. Some of their writing has appeared in The Rumpus, Them, Brooklyn Magazine, BUST, and elsewhere. Joanna also leads workshops at Brooklyn Poets. joannavalente.com / Twitter: @joannasaid / IG: joannacvalente / FB: joannacvalente
June Gehringer Tells Us What She's Afraid Of
Born and raised in Omaha, NE, JUNE GEHRINGER is a mixed Chinese trans woman who is somehow still alive. She is the author of I Don’t Write About Race (2018, CCM), I love you it looks like rain (Be About It 2017), and EVERYONE IS A BIG BUG TO SOMEONE (self-published) 2017. She is the co-founder of tenderness yea, and tweets @unlovablehottie. She holds a B.A. in English from Loyola University New Orleans and has worked as a cook since she was 16.
Joanna C. Valente is a human who lives in Brooklyn, New York. They are the author of Sirs & Madams, The Gods Are Dead, Marys of the Sea, Sexting Ghosts, Xenos, No(body) (forthcoming, Madhouse Press, 2019), and is the editor of A Shadow Map: Writing by Survivors of Sexual Assault. They received their MFA in writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Joanna is the founder of Yes Poetry and the senior managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine. Some of their writing has appeared in The Rumpus, Them, Brooklyn Magazine, BUST, and elsewhere. Joanna also leads workshops at Brooklyn Poets. joannavalente.com / Twitter: @joannasaid / IG: joannacvalente / FB: joannacvalente
5 Film & TV Inspired Nightgowns You Need
When I was a teen, my hobbies were a little singular. I loved moodily soaking in the bathtub in the middle of the night and wearing my pajamas well into the afternoon. Back then, this was the kind of behavior that led to my family and friends teasing me, constantly asking why I wasn’t hanging out at the neighborhood Arby’s like everyone else. But, it seems nightgowns are making a comeback (and perhaps they have been for a while now). In honor of Lana Del Rey’s new song, “hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have” here’s a list of some of my favorite nightwear in the media, and some links so you can get yourself a nightgown to tear around in well into the afternoon.
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Music Friyay: Stevie Nicks, Sun Ra, Hamilton Leithauser
Music brings people together. Communities are created and fostered through melodies, which is why it’s important to promote excellent work by musicians both popular and obscure from all over the world. As a music lover myself, I’m always searching for new music (regardless of when it was released).
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Poetry by Fatima-Ayan Malika Hirsi
Fatima-Ayan Malika Hirsi is the founder of Dark Moon Poetry & Arts, a monthly series which spotlights the creative feminine and non-binary energies of North Texas. She can often be found on Dallas sidewalks using her typewriter to birth poems for strangers. She has been published in Entropy, The Boiler, Anthropology Now!, Bearing the Mask, and elsewhere. Her work has been featured by WFAA, KERA, the Dallas Morning News, and others. Her chapbook, Moon Woman, is forthcoming from Thoughtcrime Press.
Poetry Weekly: Kay Ulanday Barrett, Devin Kelly, Elizabeth Metzger
As the senior managing editor at Luna Luna and the founding editor at Yes Poetry, you could say writing is important to me, especially poetry. For me, it’s vital to highlight poetic voices in order to support literature, activism, and expression.
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Poetry by Karina Bush
Karina Bush is an Irish writer, born in Belfast and now living in Rome. She is the author of three books, ‘BRAIN LACE’ (BareBackPress, 2018), ‘50 EURO’ (BareBackPress, 2017), and ‘MAIDEN’ (48th Street Press, 2016). She is currently finishing up a collection of stories set in Belfast, a story from this collection was recently published by Akashic Books. She is also a visual poet and released a set of visual poems to accompany ‘BRAIN LACE’. For more visit her website karinabush.com and Instagram https://www.instagram.com/karinabushxx/.
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Hillary Leftwich on Happiness & Why It's Important to Love Childhood Films
Hillary Leftwich is the author of the forthcoming collection Ghosts Are Just Strangers Who Know How To Knock from Civil Coping Mechanisms (CCM) Press in 2019. She earned her MFA in fiction and poetry from the Mile High MFA at Regis University. She is the poetry and prose editor for Heavy Feather Review and curator/host for At the Inkwell Denver, a monthly reading series. In her day jobs she has worked as a private investigator, maid, repo agent, and pinup model. Currently, she freelances as a writer, editor, writing workshop instructor, and guest instructor for Kathy Fish’s Fast Flash Workshop. Her writing can be found or is forthcoming in print and online in such journals as Entropy, The Missouri Review, The Review Review, Hobart, SmokeLong Quarterly, Matter Press, Literary Orphans, Sundog Lit, NANO Fiction, Occulum, Jellyfish Review, and others.
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This Moon Playlist Is Everything You Need
Joanna C. Valente is a human who lives in Brooklyn, New York. They are the author of Sirs & Madams, The Gods Are Dead, Marys of the Sea, Sexting Ghosts, Xenos, No(body) (forthcoming, Madhouse Press, 2019), and is the editor of A Shadow Map: Writing by Survivors of Sexual Assault. They received their MFA in writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Joanna is the founder of Yes Poetry and the senior managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine. Some of their writing has appeared in The Rumpus, Them, Brooklyn Magazine, BUST, and elsewhere. Joanna also leads workshops at Brooklyn Poets. joannavalente.com / Twitter: @joannasaid / IG: joannacvalente / FB: joannacvalente
Matthew Dineen is writer and events coordinator based in Philly.
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Poetry Weekly: Chloe N. Clark, Faylita Hicks, Saretta Morgan
Joanna C. Valente is a human who lives in Brooklyn, New York. They are the author of Sirs & Madams, The Gods Are Dead, Marys of the Sea, Sexting Ghosts, Xenos, No(body) (forthcoming, Madhouse Press, 2019), and is the editor of A Shadow Map: Writing by Survivors of Sexual Assault. They received their MFA in writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Joanna is the founder of Yes Poetry and the senior managing editor for Luna Luna Magazine. Some of their writing has appeared in The Rumpus, Them, Brooklyn Magazine, BUST, and elsewhere. Joanna also leads workshops at Brooklyn Poets. joannavalente.com / Twitter: @joannasaid / IG: joannacvalente / FB: joannacvalente
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