i just need to know

what is alive and what is allowed
what is alive and is it allowed
what is alive and what if it's loud

///////////////

scooped out chest empty heart


how mad mean I am at the people on the street
every car an infinite fuckup I hate you I can't stand people "like you"
where does it stem


"I just wish I wasn't allowed to live"
I can't believe I said something like this out loud ?
ppl are already working on this you know

I can do the
you can feel the



~~~~~
I had all the cats after me but they left because I'm this ~~~~
alone
how crispy waits in the cave
, two wands ready ,
yawn
but the wood one's gnawed and that
Gracie lou done it , I'm done in
have to turn away from nearly tears
the chest cavern threatening collapse
don't think of it
don't see it
don't


what is allowed and is it alive



///////////////


the synergy or whatever the fuck I used to feel with my sister, my friends
was it the comfort of copycat
mimicry as synergy


some duxjif tiktok or whatever blasted me the other day about 'autistics' and 'gestalt learning' which is supposedly about learning in chunks - learning contexts instead of - what? facts? tidbits?
anyway it made me think of how I didn't do that great on the reading/English portion of the SAT and whatever and how I was supposed to be 'so good' at that subject but I couldn't handle the stupid analogies or whatever they wer called - if blank is to blunk then blink is to ____
you'd think I'd be great at a logic problem but I could only remember words from contexts and not their actual definitions -
maybe. or I'm rewriting history to fit this narrative. (but it is true that I was not very good at those problems, or terrible at standardized tests in general.)
so rewrite it why don't you


I guess all this fuckinf AuDHD all over my scroll has got me thinking about - well okay maybe all these people wouldn't get a clinical diagnosis (or whatever that means in the first place) but isn't it interesting that they call came here in the first place? that enough people feel this amount of disconnect from the way they see 'normal' behavior/cognition/being
of course idk what happens after - I haven't dug far enough (yet?) to find out - does it remain fully pathologized, do they (we) need to feel that they (we) are medically/clinically 'different' in order to justify our existence? or being comfortable in our environments, with ourselves, ever, at all? if I call myself this thing, will I finally have permission to be a whole mess?
that's not quite what I mean. it's not just about messiness. although there is a lot that's messy about my communication styles --
anyway it's not like every freak of all time can or should be labeled in this way. do we really need it to just be ourselves?
maybe in this time period actually maybe we do. or - idk. idk what I mean by that. idk why I think the diagnosis is supposed to legitimize something. (yes you do it's what you were trained to think.) well sure. but also isn't it maybe just easier to point to the chart on the wall when people are confused? or now am I just making excuses for myself. 'why can't you ___?'
why should i? haha just kidding I literally can't bc xyz diagnosis - SEE?
(but cant I? or how much forced can/must is okay for ones mental well being?)
how much indeed.
no one is supposed to be living this way - this western way - this shit boat - tanked

this is what I get for drinking at the work function: honey and the kitties all tried to love on me and I gave them all a little pat and practically ignored them for all this gobbledy gook.

and for what! scheming on some play idea that can't exist. why. (lol it's not an idea all you have is a monologue called this drivel.) well fine but it would be cool if some local autists wanted to hang out and talk about it and put it on a stage -
(lol that is basically what oov is for you crazy nerd)
but this stagnation -
the cavern -
can't.
(shouldn't. mustn't. won't.)

well I think it's interesting to explore the idea of 'cant' actually and that is kind of what this whole mess is about?


(why can't I even share these ideas? is that the dumbest part of all? feeling too dumb to be dumb.......????????)

too dumb to be dumb lol that feels like a clown rule

also never forget "oh that was nothing, I was just _____" is the exact place where magic lives - the thing that is easy for you is not easy for everyone. how you so easily dismiss the things that come most naturally -
(oh well that's just because that's what everyone i knew did while I was growing up so obviously that is the good and normal thing to do and what else even is there?)

-- to be loved
-- to be known
you have to --
breathe being

possibly. wtf am I talking about.


//////////////


what if it was never poems but always plays ?

(cmon nothing's never always ! )



//////////////


lol then I go on instagrung and it's immediately feeding all the same shit back to me aka I have no original ideas (and neither does anyone else but they make memes instead of whatever tf I'm doing which is all of nothing)

 

//////////////


BUT ALSO How easy it is to believe that everyone is having the same conversation bc the algorithms have turned us all so niche needlepointed at such particulars that we all agree all the time with yeah the 10 people that share our exact interests
and I actually have no ducking clue how large of a conversation this is --.

well I do know autistic folks and disability activists have been on this shit for years so

the lyric that won't go away the last few days
"I'm trying real hard to try"


(am I tho?)

you will never see my face samurai




(never - always)

distinction impossible

 everything builds 

tubular tuber, somehow soup

Alanna Artstew, fairy spud, whisks up words and serves them candied–a butterscotch forgotten under the table, bedazzled with dirt. Sticky treasure gravitates towards them, accumulates in speckled circles, pile files. Alanna's cast-offs congregation woos few, but those it enchants grow viscous, melting into each other + new versions of themselves; by embracing briars, they make room for hope.

Artstew boils queer temporality and self-mythology dyed by the ink of font books, mixes in slippery music with newsflash nightmare, and concocts rich soup, a constant spinning potion. Their aim is medicinal, their work incidental. Occasionally palatable. Alanna lives for the lyric.

Roll out the well-worn rug

Company's coming over

Discover treasure under tables

Trash dines on the floor

Alanna Artstew, all together tuber, hopes y'all liked the cake and wishes everybuddy everyday a happy new year -- what better time for revolutions!?

[[Write an eye-catching bio, aiming for fresh imagery and the language only you could assemble to describe you.]]

spring beauty swoon song

March was starting to spring, the backyard was green and that was fine. Mama pointed at blobs in trees, that’s the downy woodpecker, that’s that old cardinal again would he just quit it, that’s that’s i’ll have to check my app. All their songs come down to “hey baby” in the end the birds radio mtv2 all align in constant cat call “do you want me or not?” i’ll tell you now i can’t tell the difference so dont be surprised cry outraged when i yawn at whatever cishet romance streams on some screen i’m telling you now i’m–

march spring green fine songs fade for the scrape of the door skipping in its track you slide smooth through eclipse the green damn the moon sun leo love shine spot light on you.
yeah you heard me flowers pale where my beauty blooms she slick sweet sidle all peach fuschia turquoise light’ll leave every corner block party to shine on her and see see sweet tea you step no shade pulse through me again run currents single file signal fire burn leo sun light shine your shine toward ripe black currants find hidden color purple petals ripe currants dew wet berry pulse pale me

you, electric, shine.

Nobody better bother yelling by now those songs of homogenous hope know better by now chatter simmer down. He’ll leave you by summer leaf green lost lover lonesome nest tattered under trees. Mama blessherheart collects wholest remains of homes forgotten when the chicks have flown.
Empty nest mantelpiece display. Romcom reboot every damn day.

Ours i’ve already told you, the humidity abysmal, 4 ceiling fans 1 floor and 2 window units, home stays hot april to october, we nested bodies heat it hotter dripping water dowsing divining spring green ground swell key hole of summer lover shiver sip her long days long tongue nights burn run on shine.

[[Wednesday's prompt -- We've spent a lot of time thinking and writing about hard stuff, haven't we? And though our trials are as individual as our tastes, there is one universal truth: we all want to love and be loved. Maybe we avoid the subject as writers because we don't want to risk sentimentality or greeting card poetry. But today, let's celebrate joy! Familial, romantic, plutonic, (and however we might describe love of nature, animals, and learning), let it be our subject today. Feel free to experiment with form and style--your only directive is to woo us.]]

patchwork

I've noticed I write about myself A LOT. I'd like to move beyond that, but maybe I need to purge some of these old stories before I can move forward...? I'm not sure how to deal with that. But my own experiences have been my main subject over these last 9 weeks.

Some themes I'm finding:
-- family (both biological and chosen), acceptance, connections and broken connections
--mental health, queer/trans identity, personal autonomy, dysphoria
--the constant quiet hum of everyday trauma in late stage capitalism, implications of privilege and oppression
--joy, performance, play, art, music, collaboration, looking toward a beautiful future built for/by everyone

Sometimes it gets pretty dark but I've attempted to include humor in various ways.

I guess pretty much I'm using my stories, micro experiences, to talk/think/feel/stumble through macro patterns of culture + society.... but that's kinda what creative nonfiction is all about isn't it?! stories let us see each other... okay so that's not really an insight.

Feels like I've moved through a lot of different tones and writing styles, which is making it hard for me to see how things could fit together. Unless it's just an oversized patchwork quilt.

I notice when I'm putting more thought/care into language, I write more for sound + rhythm. (maybe this is falling into old patterns tho-- too easy?) Lots of lyrical stuff happening. Other times, it seems more like rambling, a runaway train (or kite).

Of course y'all have different preferences so I'm not able to concretely say what has been "most effective." I often think of my self(s) in multiples so I never know whose voice is gonna show up. I wonder how important consistency is. A clown is infinite, anything is possible, so maybe I'm carrying that into writing too.... actually I think I hope I'm doing that!

The various prompts have been ridiculously helpful for thinking in new ways and finding stories hidden in places I wouldn't have expected. That has been such a learning experience and so much fun!

Any feedback or random thoughts about my random thoughts would be much appreciated! Thanks, buddies.

[[TUESDAY PROMPT: Spend some time thinking about the themes that have emerged in your work over the course of these ten weeks. Are there recurring images or topics? How might the snippets be woven together into a longer piece? It might be a good idea to print all of your responses to the prompts (including those that weren't related to the prompt but were part of your own projects). Can you see any connections? Please share your findings, so we can offer our insights as readers.]]

writing class wrap up

 hey future self! you are about to post all your prompts from this creative nonfiction class so far because guess what it's kind of what today's exercise is about! called look at everything we wrote and try to connect the dots. images, themes, etc. so WHAT BETTER TIME to carefully arrange these bread crumbs?! little lost loon. 

also i am telling you right now that you are NOT gonna be freakin ridiculous ocd about this like usual and put the exact time of day i wrote/posted these. no no no you are not. just get em in here, welcome welcome. 

also guess what, blogger fucking sucksssssss bc goog killed it dead and you have gotta get out of here. you know they fucked up the formatting on all your old posts. and now they have this nightmare box where you paste anything in from gmail or wherever and it automatically includes the background color???? what fresh hell is this! the old blogger would never be so stupid, as it would have known we all want our pink and tan boxes set up just right. please. cmon. goog. why. 

well you've looked at substack and patreon and ghost and blah blah blah 

no one wants to read any of this anyway

well maybe they do! what do you know about it! 

these little scrapples even? this stuff from class? it's just dribbles. blots. 

okay so they're blots. okay so what. you have been getting a lot of good feedback and maybe there's someone who wants to read this aka SOMEONE FOR EVERYONE as i keep trying to remind myself, yes yes yes there's certainly an audience for everything. because that is just the way the world works. i'm not so unique as to be unrelatable to every other person crawling round this rock. cmon. 

okay so shut up and post the posts and dont worry about the formatting like we said 

okay fine

p.s. you should also save the prompts you didn't write and maybe do those some time when you are stuck

just thought of another disclaimer (3:10pm) called i really am not bothering to post these on the days i actually wrote them. i'm just posting the prompts. sometimes i did 0 and sometimes i did 2 or 3. so dont go using this as an excuse of like ohh look when i wrote every day bc you fuckin diddnt

you couldn't take it anymore and you had to fix the formatting. and you thought no one (brett) would ever read the posts if they look so bad. so it's taking forever and you haven't done the homework! (4:19pm)

a sterilized send off

WEEK NINE - When Is It Finished?
In conjunction with "No Such Thing as a True Story", please write a scene from the point of view of someone with whom you've recently argued/disagreed. What does the 'truth' look like from his/her vantage point?

All the groups warned her this would happen.

"Sadly, this catches up with all us sufferers of environmental illness. First the establishment doctors, then our brainwashed friends and families. They just won't listen to the truth."

I never had to say "I don't believe you" for her to hear it. She stood at full attention waiting for the day I, too, would follow this unavoidable pattern. Just one more misery on top of all her other suffering.


The internet groups chorus, "Cut them out. You don't need more negativity in your life."

She's packing up her trailer with what few belongings she has left. Extreme mold avoidance protocols necessitated a "clean break," meaning she trashed everything she owned, as it could be either carrying or attracting toxins. Her bass. Her clown nose. The harddrive housing all our songs from 2019. Her phone, car, computer. Every few weeks, she buys new clothes, tents, sleeping bags for temporary use, then dumps them when they've absorbed the toxins escaping her body. To donate them would be irresponsible.

We used to call each other "creative soul mates" and now we can barely breathe the same air. Literally. She can't come inside my house, as most buildings in our humid town trigger her mold symptoms, which include debilitating physical reactions as well as anxiety, OCD, and self-harm. That's why she's moving into this trailer, planning to park somewhere with good air.

I struggle to find words that won't sting. Every interaction a mine field. If my concern crosses the border of total agreement, I turn enemy. My poisoned position sparks a flare up; she's compromised, unreachable. Her mind and body retaliate but she takes all the hits. I'm helpless. My truth can't not hurt her.

So just smile and step back. Feel complicit in your deference. Hope for the best.

"Good luck on your trip!"

not quite quotes

What is your favorite quote about writing or writers? Explain...

I reach, but recall fails me. A cavern holds the memory of treasure, as each tide swishes in and steals whatever's sat there. Not a damn thing stays where I put it, and that's a promise.

Say, “a scroll in the morning is death to a writer,” which I saw, would you believe it,
on social media, and though I’ve mangled the original words, I do believe it –
screens steal our sacred thoughts, which may be even eviler than their theft of our time.

“They took as they tasted the best of my wine; they took me down dancing the rape of the vine.”

In my own quote, I thought I was quoting another poem, but I can’t find it– whose words are they, then?

I’m nearly sure Adrienne Rich told us poetry might be the purest form of art, in that its very essence could never be commodified or captured by capitalism. I’ve hung my hat on this one for at least a decade, so deeply I want it to be true but meanwhile shrink and sniffle at even the idea I could wear that wondrous robe, “Poet,” and those that do, bless you, bless you. I think I need to trust that there’s a secret room, locked to merchandisers and advertisers, where Truth will bloom and not be plucked, where Beauty fruits and Ugly struts, without the compromise of commerce tying y’all in knots.

Where is diction’s temple? The sanctuary of verbiage?

“The rebellion of art is a daily rebellion against the state of living death routinely called real life.” And if that doesn’t rattle your bones, I don’t know what will. Jeannette Winterson peels back the curtain of certainty (the pinprick of history we cling to as canon), reveals the stage of flesh as the show itself–a play of finite bodies treading the boards of the infinite. We make to move beyond. We must.

(alt title= constructing a home for language)