#and the poetry book is like... it's just a maybe

[th3-steambird]

Hiii! May I please request some soft yandere Kazuha? Maybe when he first fell in love with reader?🩷

Where the leavesblow

Soft Yan!Kazuha x gn reader

Warnings: Yan!Kazuha, Not reread, not proofread 😭

An: I went through three drafts of this and I still don’t like it 😭😭 But I didn’t want to keep you waiting long so I just kinda went, ‘Fine, we ball’ 💀 I hope it passes 💙 (Hate the poetry by the way but I thought it fitted since Kazuha writes powtry so whatever… 😭😭😭)

Summary: Kazuha, Your dearest-

“To fallen trees and and water freeze”

You really didn’t know when it started.

You were a simple citizen of Inazuma, doing your everyday duties for the Yashiro commission, daydreaming about the books you read and giggling with your friends about the pretty people you saw or read about.

Then some of your fantasies came true.

“Y/n. Do you need help with that?”

Again, you didn’t know when the famous Kazuha had decided it was worth his time to pop around wherever you were at random moments and offer to assist you with your duties or take you to witness the famous sights of Inazuma to clear your mind.

“A-ah. Sure, Kazuha. Though when did you get here…?” You asked, mystified as you give him a slightly confused yet still thankful look.

“A few seconds ago.” He said casually, still with his usual stoic tone as he crouched down beside you to see what you were currently working on. You pointed out shyly the parts you didn’t understand or the words that seemed to be needed to be improved.

Time passed like the breeze, soft and unwavering yet almost unoticeable.

You were finally done with that godforsaken report.

Turning to Kazuha with a bright smile, you hugged him happily, “Oh Kazuha, what would I do without you?” You giggled, burrying your head in the crook of his neck. 

Perhaps it was your imagination, but maybe you heard him whisper back, “Yes…what could you?”

Thats silly though. This is the legendary Kazuha.

“To you I pledge to follow like the breeze”

“Your smile, your laugh so radiant like the sky”

“Kazuha! Kazuha!” You called happily, seeing your best friend walking in the street, his usual passive expression written on his face until he turned to you, his eyes softening. “Y/n.” 

Kazuha and you were closer now. It seems efforts from both sides finally made you two the bestest of friends!

…

…

He was your only friend now.

That was weird.

“I am yours and you are mine until you die.

 

“Fate shall catch you by surprise”

“Y/n. Where have you been?” Kazuha asked lightly, leaning on your shoulder as you two rested on a bench overlooking the sea.

You recounted happily your visit to Liyue, describing the handmade lanterns you had (attempted) to make to the friends you had made whilst on the business trip.

Well, for some reason the latter seemed to darken his look, but it must have been your imagination.

“Y/n…you don’t need to work that hard. I can provide for both of us…all you need to do is stay by my side.” He told you as he turned his head, looking you straight in the eye. 

“…?” You stared back for a while, then giggled, “Thats silly Kazu.” You had laughed at the time, chuckling at his joke as your conversation stretched on.

He was joking, what were you worrying about?

This was Kazuha, what reason would your friend have to do all that when you were self sufficient? 

“So I shall keep you safe from your demise”

 

“Kazuha!?”

            - From your love

                Kazuha

[majicmarker]

well i think the problem is that i want to write something that makes me happy, but i'm Not happy, so trying to access that feeling is... murky.

[moregraceful]

my hot take as a person with an english degree and a library degree is that some of the dorkiest fiction and poetry ever committed to paper in the english language came out of the iowa writer's workshop so it is at best goofy and at worst completely futile to argue that your average amazon unlimited writer is having a more deleterious effect on literacy and literature.

[firstfullmoon]

does anyone have an ereader and read lots of poetry and/or pdfs on it and if so which ereader would you recommend

[stuckinapril]

i love anthologies. anthologies are so sexy

[anxiouslowercase]

sas rh: let eoin survive the fall au » a tale of two lieutenants (part two)

[invinciblerodent]

hang on, this was a very out of pocket thought I had in like, tags on a thing, but fuck, it's actually very sweet to think about the PC early on in their relationship picking and pressing flowers for Karlach

like as a "I saw this and thought of you, but I couldn't give it to you then, so I saved it for when you can enjoy it too"? adorable.

I'm kind of really into this idea of Mara keeping a journal in her attempts to recover her memories, and also pressing flowers between the pages. I'd have to work out the specifics of how their relationship is going to work out once I get there in act 3 (I tried not to spoil myself, but something tells me a romanced Karlach is gonna be pretty upset about Gortash greeting her lover so warmly so maybe an apology gift will be needed), but the idea of the two of them going through a book-bouquet together, almost as kind of a "the person he knew is not who I am anymore, this is who I am, this is the me who loves you" thing is really sweet

like.

"this one is from near where we first met- look, this leaf is even singed where your heat had touched it, like it touched me."

"this one is from just outside camp, and I picked it the night I told you I liked you, because I was just so happy."

"this is from near Rosymorn, when I looked at you just enjoying the breeze, and thought that you looked particularly beautiful."

"this is the prettiest flower I could find near Reithwin, and it may be a pathetic, wretched little thing, but it still grew stubbornly where it wasn't supposed to, and it reminded me of how your love took root in my heart."

"this one is my favorite color, and I wasn't sure why I thought that until I realized it's the same color as your eyes."

and so on and so on.

i'm about to chew gravel istg

[rearranging-deck-chairs]

obsessed with their different reactions to being called starcrossed lovers

[thesagekissoftime]

Hello, my dears. Has anyone else been entirely losing their sense of self again? I don't think I've ever truly known who I am in my entirety, but recently, I have been experiencing frequent identity crises and I'm wondering if that is the new activity of the summer for us depressed literature, art and greek myth obsessed people or if it's simply me

[aredredrosebyanyothername]

I'm currently rereading This is How you Lose the Time War and man it is so good. It is so clearly such a well planed out story. The shadow is so subtle but so obvious once you know about it. Also the give and take with red and blue and the agencies are so well done. It hits this fantastic point where, yes in many ways they are polar opposites, but that only makes the similarities more blaring.

[britneyshakespeare]

Let slaves in mind be servile to their fears;

Our heart is high instarred in brighter spheres.

Fernando, IV.ii of Love's Sacrifice (1633) by John Ford

[yarns-alt]

On the topic of "Live, Laugh, Love."

Text and alternate lighting under cut

"Maybe we're too hard

on the women with

LIVE. LAUGH. LOVE.

hung on the walls of their very own homes.

Maybe, it's that SIMPLE after all."

"Maybe it's enough to find somethin(g) within

that can be dedicated and claimed"

"Maybe I can simply be

ALIVE. HAPPY. AND KIND."

[mathmusicreading]

@yummysuika @ospreywhite I really appreciate your translation work; can you explain more about shichen timekeeping to me? Because I know a tiny bit of modern Mandarin Chinese, but I can't recognize the shichens as the zodiac animals:

Zi (I don't know "rat", so I actually can't make any argument here.)

Chou (I don't know "ox", but I reasonably could have expected "niu" for "cow".)

Yin (I know "tiger" as "hu".)

Mao (I don't know "rabbit", but to me "mao" is "cat".)

Chen (I know "dragon" as "long".)

Si (I don't know "snake", but now I find it interesting that it sounds like death, like snakes could be seen as evil in Chinese culture similar to how they are seen in the Christian world.)

Wu (I know "horse" as "ma".)

Wei (I know "sheep/goat" as "yang".)

Shen (I don't know "monkey", but I would have expected "Sun" or "Wu" or "Kong" because of "Monkey King".)

You (I know "rooster/chicken" as " ji".)

Xu (I know "dog" as "gou".)

Hai (I don't know "pig/boar" unless "pork" and "pig" are the same "siu".)

I tried asking my parents, but they just starting talking about how the Chinese zodiac is actually a 60-year cycle with the 12 animals and the 5 elements. So are these shichen names the "Pre-Han dynasty semi-descriptive terms"? Is it kind of like the difference between "midday" and "noon" in English? The former is a "descriptor", the latter is a "name", but they "mean" the same thing?

(I tried checking the etymology for "noon" on dictionary.com, so to be fair "ninth hour" is a descriptor, but in Modern English it's not really recognizable as such and so for the sake of my shichen question, I'm calling "noon" a "name".)

Or is this another language/dialect or due to the evolution of language (changing words and pronunciations)?

I was also looking up the Dragon Boat Festival being on the unluckiest day of the year, and it says, "The Chinese name of the festival is pronounced differently in different Chinese languages. Duanwu��(端午) literally means 'starting horse'—i.e., the first "horse day" of the month according to the Chinese zodiac." so I was able to get the exact character for "wu". I think it's interesting that Wikipedia says "literally ... horse" but putting 午 into Google Translate yields "midday, noonday, seventh earthly branch, 11 a.m.-1 p.m." It's unfortunate that Wikipedia only says "different Chinese languages" for "Duanwu" instead of specifying them or time periods, but I appreciate it listing different romanizations by country for Cantonese.

Would you say there's any pattern to Chinese writers or English translators using the above terms vs. using "hour/time/head/body/tail of the (insert zodiac animal here)"? Like if one sounds better for a historical fantasy setting, or choosing to use the pinyin in English instead of translating to not be translating literally? ETA: I should have gotten onto a computer sooner. I asked my parents and then you guys because searching "shichen" in Wikipedia just resulted in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_units_of_measurement. But further digging took me to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Chinese_timekeeping. I'll probably get answers there (Maybe I'll even be able to explain to my dad why he was thinking of ten stems and not matching mathematically with "60 is from 12 times 5, not 10 times 6" when he was trying to lecture on the 60-year cycle for the Chinese zodiac, lol.), so my apologies for bothering you. I'd still appreciate your thoughts on what was formerly the last paragraph about writing and translation choices!

[coquelicoq]

i’ve been trying to think of ways to keep up my spanish since i moved and don’t know as many people to speak it with here; i saw you’re reading out loud in french every day how’s that going? would you recommend it to maintain fluency? :)

it's going well! it's great for maintaining vocab for sure, especially if you read recent stuff (as opposed to novels from the 1800s lol). and it's been helping a ton with my pronunciation; actually speaking the words helps with your own articulation as well as your oral comprehension to a lesser extent. i think it's a pretty good option in the absence of conversational partners, and it's really not necessary to spend a ton of time on it per day, especially if you're already fluent. you could read a chapter a day (or 10 pages, or 5 pages, or whatever) just to keep your hand in. worth a try if you have some spanish-language books available!

[astrxealis]

okay rambles but i started creatively writing in like ... 5th grade? and. oh god just a little encouragement to anyone looking to get into writing or insecure or whatnot, but HELLS, maybe it's to he expected with my (obviously) very young age and inexperience with writing then, but my writing was really. yeah. Yeah. but then i'm what... a lot older now, obviously, and my writing has gotten leagues better. i'm probably not a good example for this bcs childhood years development stuff are different etc etc BUT practicing writing more and whatnot really does go a long way :]

[mzannthropy]

I really want to put all of my Billy x Camila fix-it headcanons (the show version, I'm ok with the book, it's the TV series that did it badly) in one comprehensive post one of these days. I still haven't decided if I want more kids for them or not, which is probably a good indication that the answer is no, bc if I did want the twins in this AU, I'd already think of them, and I don't think of them. I keep picturing just Billy, Camila and Julia. I toy with the idea of them fostering an orphan boy, at some point, a child of immigrants (Camila and Julia can both speak Spanish fluently) but it's in a vague stage. I see Camila as pursuing her career in photography, bc come on, all that gear she had in the show? That must have been some expensive shit. Nowadays any fucker thinks they're a photographer, but this was the 1970s. I'll just have to discard their conversation about kids they had in bed, same as everything I didn't like about the show (who can stop me), even though it was one of the better scenes for their ship. Most of all, Camila doesn't die. Not until she's 97, which means she's alive and well at this moment in 2024. As for the rest of the characters, they're all happy and work through any issues they have. Bc at the end of the day, I want everyone to be happy, even the characters I don't care that much about. Peace out.