#Aimee Nezhukumatathil

[feral-ballad]

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, from Oceanic; “When I’m away from you, I feel like the second-place winner in a bee-wearing contest”

[kiisuuumii]

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, from "Spring (a conversation)," featured in Leaning toward Light

[havingapoemwithyou]

Letters from Two Gardens by Ross Gay & Aimee Nezhukumatathil

[sageandscorpiongrass]

hiii can you do web weaving about finding your true purpose in this world?

The world is so vast and beautiful and I am exactly where I'm supposed to be.

I'm terribly sorry this took so long! ;^^

No Accidents, Nikita Gill | Baked Goods, Aimee Nezhukumatathil | Errand Upon Which We Came, Stephanie Strickland | Ulysses, Alfred Lord Tennyson | Bluebonnet Scene, Robert Julian Onderdonk | In Way of Music Water Answers, Adam Wolfond | The House Was Quiet and The World Was Calm, Wallace Stevens | Cento Between the Ending and the End, Cameron Awkward-Rich | Cat Stop, Farah | The Invention of the Interstate System, Mira Rosenthal | Watching you talk on the phone, I consider the empty space around atoms–, Rhiannon McGavin | Presumably Dead Arm, Sidney Gish | Oakland in Rain, Aria Aber

[text transcription and image ID in alt text]

[asoftepiloguemylove]

hi uhm, i was listening to cinnamon girl by lana del rey and there was this lyric "if you hold without hurting me, you'll be the first who ever did" and it would be amazing if you did a webweave based on that <3333

on love and healing

i decided to take this into a more positive direction, i hope that's okay !! have a good day <33

@ruhlare / Call Me By Your Name (2017) dir. Luca Guadagnino / Aimee Nezhukumatathil Baked Goods (via @girlfictions) / Cassandra Clare City of Glass / Lana Del Rey Cinnamon Girl / E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) dir. Steven Spielberg / @typewriter-worries

[a-ramblinrose]

“The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.” 🦋

[bangbangwhoa]

books I’ve read in 2024 📖 no. 145

World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

“There is a time for stillness, but who hasn’t also wanted to scream with delight at being outdoors? To simply announce themselves and say, I’m here, I exist?”

[smokefalls]

For what is home if not the first place where you learn what does and does not nourish you? The first place you learn to sit still and slow down when someone offers you a bite to eat?

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Bite by Bite: Nourishments and Jamborees

[youritalianbookpal]

Top 10 reads of 2024

I haven't been as active here in 2024 as in other years, but I still feel like sharing my top 10 fo the year. No idea how, but I managed to read 52 books overall - the goal was 49 and I honestly thought I wouldn't reach it... Let's see which books were the best of the bunch to me :)

Kallocain by Karin Boye

Extremely beautiful dystopian novel. I feel like this is what people think 1984 is when they get disappointed by it (I'm saying this as a compliment). It's the story of a scientist who lives under an oppressive totalitarian state, and discovers a potent truth serum. 10/10, would recommend to everyone ever to read this.

2. Summer by Ali Smith

Don't ask me why I began reading the seasonal quartet from the last book, but so far this is the only one I read and... I loved it. It made me emotional in all the best ways. This has raised the stakes for the other three books of the series (I plan on reading Autumn in 2025 but why knows, might take me another two or three business years to actually do it).

3. All Men Are Mortal by Simone de Beauvoir

I think I should tell you that I picked up this book by chance from my mom's bookcase - as usual she knew she read it and remembered nothing of it. This novel felt like a slap in the face, and I don't understand how people can't always remember it after having read it. This is the story of an immortal man who regrets his immortality, and somehow it's an in-dept analysis of humankind's mortality and... I don't know how else to describe it if not the aforementioned slap in the face. Absolutely majestic.

4. The Biggest Prison on Earth by Ilan Pappé

This book should be mandatory in every school but alas. I don't think it's a good recommentation for people who never approached the subject of the history of Palestine, but I think it could still prove extremely useful to people who are interested in the topic - and let's face it, we all should be.

5. Act your age, Eve Brown by Talia Hibbert

Took me ages to finally finish the Brown sisters series, and I loved this third instalment just so much. I think Eve and Jacob are a great exaple of well written enemies to lovers - or whatever "sorry I accidentally run you over with my car, let me help you run your B&B" is supposed to be. It's my favorite trope and it better be done like this more often.

6. Velvet was the Night by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

I think I'll remember this novel for the wrong reason - it's so far the only book by Moreno-Garcia I didn't give 5 stars (I gave it a 4.75 so I should really just shut up). But I really enjoyed it, as it's written well, the characters are compelling, and it takes place in a moment in the history of Mexico I didn't know much about, which made it a good reason to do further research, something I always like. And, may I say? It has one of my favorite endings in all the Moreno-Garcia books.

7. From the River to the Sea: Essays for a Free Palestine ed. Sai Englert, Rosie Warren, Michal Schatz

Extremely upset I didn't have access to this while I was writing my Master's thesis (don't care if it has been published 2 years after my graduation ok). Please read this if you can.

8. Legendborn by Tracy Deonn

First book I read completely in 2024 and it was GREAT. I spent the year looking for Bloodmaker at my usual bookshop, but I will end up having to order it on their website. I need to know how the story goes, ok? This book wins the Best Plot Twist of the Year award to me (which means it's the best written, the one with the best build up, and not done for shock value).

9. Bite by Bite: Nourishment and Jamborees by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

World of Wonders, which I read a couple of years ago, is still one of my favorite books. This is basically the food version of it, so how could I not love this one too? it's so caring, so loving, so beautifully written: I can't ask anything else from a book.

10. Our wives under the sea by Julia Armfield

I'm not good with books that scare me. This scared me just enough to be able to finish it and still be so full of dread I could cry. If you're not a whimp like me you will probably think this is very tame, but to me the not knowing will always be more upsetting than the knowing.

Honorable mentions

I decided to put in the top 10 only books I read for the first time last year, but it was also a year I allowed myself some re-reads, which I think still deserve to be mentioned. Girl Woman Other by Bernardine Evaristo was maybe even better than I remember it, and I remember loving it dearly on the first read as well. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf, which I listened to as audiobooks but read ages ago, cemented themselves as some of my favorite classics.

[kitchen-light]

There's a spot over Lake Superior where migrating butterflies veer sharply. No one understood why they made such a quick turn at the specific place until a geologist finally made the connection: a mountain rose out of the water in that exact location thousands of years ago. These butterflies and their offspring can still remember a mass they've never seen, sound waves breaking just so, and fly out of the way. How did they pass on this knowledge of the invisible? Does this message transmit through the song they sing to themselves on their first wild nights, spinning inside a chrysalis? Or in the music kissed down their backs as they crack themselves open to the morning sun? Does milkweed whisper instructions to them as it scatters in the meadow?

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, from “World of Wonders | In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks and Other Astonishments”, Souvenir Press, 2021

[judgeitbyitscover]

World of Wonders by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Cover art by Fumi Mini Nakamura

Milkweed Editions, September 2020

As a child, Nezhukumatathil called many places home: the grounds of a Kansas mental institution, where her Filipina mother was a doctor; the open skies and tall mountains of Arizona, where she hiked with her Indian father; and the chillier climes of western New York and Ohio. But no matter where she was transplanted—no matter how awkward the fit or forbidding the landscape—she was able to turn to our world’s fierce and funny creatures for guidance. “What the peacock can do,” she tells us, “is remind you of a home you will run away from and run back to all your life.” The axolotl teaches us to smile, even in the face of unkindness; the touch-me-not plant shows us how to shake off unwanted advances; the narwhal demonstrates how to survive in hostile environments. Even in the strange and the unlovely, Nezhukumatathil finds beauty and kinship. For it is this way with wonder: it requires that we are curious enough to look past the distractions in order to fully appreciate the world’s gifts.

[feral-ballad]

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, from Oceanic; “When You Select the Daughter Card”

[dk-thrive]

For what is home if not the first place where you learn what does and does not nourish you? The first place you learn to sit still and slow down when someone offers you a bite to eat?

— Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Bite by Bite: Nourishments and Jamborees (Ecco, April 30, 2024)

[havingapoemwithyou]

Letters from Two Gardens by Ross Gay & Aimee Nezhukumatathil

[contremineur]

Baby, don’t even come near me with that napkin. Just let me at each bone, slick & sweet with smoky sugar sauce. See all the steam when I nudge all the meat off with my tongue? (The only kind of cloud we see this lemonade day in June). All this driving & I need to feel food in my hands no knife or fork tonight. I want to burn my lips just enough, but not too much it hurts to kiss. & that reminds me of the glowing heart inside me. How each rib curves around, locks tight in neat snaps along the back—make your hand like that around my small wrist & lead me to the bathroom. Stand with me in the shower feel the tender spot just underneath my ribs, lift my hands above my head & trace the space- bone-space-bone- space-bone down my sides with a blue bar of soap—let this be the only way I’ll ever come clean.

Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Why I crave ribs tonight

from here

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Lower East Side • New York City • 1940's :: Flashback Frames

* * * *

I love this sentence for a bunch of reasons, including that a lot of people think being broken is unusual, a violation of the terms of agreement, and the end of the story rather than something that quite often happens in the middle. What often happens after that with skin, bones, hearts, and other things is repair...... And sometimes post-traumatic growth.

Roshi Joan Halifax, 2022: "The experience of breakdown can give one a very deep and optimistic view of the potential of others to grow from trauma, instead of being diminished. This is called post-traumatic growth and refers to the benefit from psychological changes that can be experienced as a result of the struggle with challenging life circumstances. It can foster greater resilience. We have to remember that people who have survived trauma can come back transformed by the experience and see that suffering has made them more resilient rather than more fragile, with the ability to thrive in the present rather than being overwhelmed by the past. Beyond the ending of the old way of being, there is hope for the emergence of the new, and to imagine a future in which the wounds are still there, but in a form that makes one wiser and humbler and helps one to thrive."

+

"One of the pleasures of getting older is learning that though we are not all broken the same, we're all broken."

~ Ross Gay

(From a marvelous interview with Aimee Nezhukumatathil in Poets & Writers last year.)

[Rebecca Solnit]