#love this show in all its weirdness and queer glory

[hyog-blog]

I love these dorks :D Best found family ever)))

[hairstevington]

flowers and ink (final part)

Eddie Munson x Steve Harrington

Summary: Eddie and Steve are happy. Chrissy and Robin are happy. Jonathan meets Argyle. Everyone is happy!

Part one, part two, part three, part four part five part six part seven part eight link to Ao3

Word Count: 1100

Warnings: So sweet you'll get a cavity tbh, Jargyle (because why not), they are idiots one last time, also more Gareth!

Author's Note: Awww, it was emotional to close this one out! Thank you to all who have read and followed along. I can't believe this was only going to be 2 parts at first. I am a FOOL with Steddie brainrot. Until next time!!

Steve wasn’t sure what he was expecting when Eddie said he’d gotten him a gift, but it sure as shit wasn’t this. 

“Oh, my god,” Steve said, holding it up to see it in all its glory. A t-shirt with words printed over a rainbow across the chest: Steve & Robin - Not dating, just gay and codependent. 

“Obviously, I have one for Robin too,” Eddie said, tossing Steve a second shirt. 

“Oh, my God!” Steve repeated, laughing this time. It was perfect and so incredibly weird. He couldn’t wait to model them with his best friend and take the most ridiculous not-couple pictures of all time. “This is - I mean, Jesus! I love it, but would you let me be the impressive one for once?”

Eddie looked Steve up and down, then smirked. 

“With those abs? Don’t worry, you’re still the impressive one here.” Steve blushed, then sat up in bed so he could put the shirt on, but Eddie stopped him. “Woaaaah there, what are you doing? You can’t cover up, I’m enjoying the view.” Steve rolled his eyes.

“You’re not going to let me use the gift you got me?”

“Not yet,” Eddie replied. “I’m actually kind of regretting the whole thing now. You should probably never wear a shirt ever again. Can I have it back actually?” Steve chuckled, then smacked Eddie playfully on the arm.

“No way.”

“Steve, you wound me," Eddie joked. "But fine, as you wish."

Eddie and Steve had been official for 2 months at this point, and everything was kind of perfect. They each continued to work their respective jobs, and with their added happiness came enhanced customer service. 

Bob was happy - both for Eddie’s shift in demeanor as well as for the business. They were doing great! Plus, he got bonus points as a step-dad for introducing Will to Eddie and the shop. Will came to visit a few more times, and this time he got to talk to Steve, too. It was clear that seeing a happy gay couple was important for Will. He hadn’t seen much of that in his small town, so seeing Eddie and Steve be so grossly into each other was refreshing. 

And gross.

But mostly refreshing!

One day, Will’s older brother dropped Will off at the shop, introducing yet another cool person into the friend group - Jonathan. By then, Eddie had succeeded in making Argyle his friend, and the two of them spent many nights smoking and watching those stupid stoner comedies together in Argyle’s weird, confusingly giant house that he somehow lived in. 

Seriously, how did the guy have a house like that already? How did he have the money to travel so much with Chrissy? Her show was good and all, but it couldn’t possibly be getting her that much income. 

In any case, Argyle and Eddie were buds, so Argyle also happened to be around when Jonathan walked into Ink About It. 

The bromance between Jonathan and Argyle was pretty much immediate. Eddie would have felt mildly jealous about it if he hadn’t noticed some very familiar (aka queer) vibes between the two. Perhaps Will wasn’t the only Byers grappling with their identity, that's all Eddie was saying - but it was just speculation. Eddie kept his mouth shut (except to Steve, obviously, who fully agreed). In due time, as with anything else. 

So then they all hung out - Chrissy, Jonathan, Argyle, Steve, Eddie, and Robin. They’d formed quite the friend group - all of them getting along with each other beautifully. Argyle even hosted a road trip with the squad in his giant pizza van (???) so that they could all surprise Gareth at a Corroded Coffin show.

That night was epic, and it finally cemented Robin and Chrissy as girlfriends.

After their date, they’d both been super into each other - undeniably so. Yet, because Chrissy was so often moving around, they’d decided it was best to just stay friends. 

Yeah. Eddie and Steve knew that wouldn’t last very long. 

It still lasted longer than it should have, and the pining was rampant. Every time they all hung out, the two women wouldn’t stop staring at each other, cracking jokes, and giving everyone else in the room ample opportunities to share knowing glances…

And then they went on the road trip, and they got super drunk, and Robin tended to speak a lot more freely when she was intoxicated. 

She professed her love to Chrissy on the dance floor. 

It was a bold move, but it paid off. Chrissy and Argyle extended their stay in Hawkins, and Robin and Chrissy became an official couple. 

Coincidentally, that night was also pretty huge for Eddie and Steve. Firstly, because Chrissy and Robin had dropped the “I love you’s” before they had, which felt kind of ridiculous, considering Eddie and Steve obviously loved each other. 

“The fucking lesbians stole my thunder!” Eddie yelled from the bar, watching Robin and Chrissy hug each other on the dance floor.

“What are you talking about?” Steve asked, amused at his boyfriend’s antics.

“Ladies and Gentleman!”

Gareth’s voice boomed from the stage. The band had taken a quick break, but were back on. Eddie grinned, then grabbed Steve’s hand.

“Come on,” he said. “Let’s get closer.” They wandered through the crowd (past Chrissy and Robin) as Gareth continued. 

“We’ve got a surprise for you all. You see, my boy Eddie Munson requested we play a special song tonight. So, this one’s for you, Flower Boy. Lord knows we wouldn’t play this for anyone else.”

Before Steve could even process what was happening, the band began to play. It wasn’t metal, it was -

“I Melt With You,” Steve said once he recognized it. “I love this song.”

“Iiiiii know!” Eddie responded, laughing. He pulled Steve into him so they could swing along to the music. “This was my whole master plan. Was gonna have them play this and tell you I loved you and it was going to be this whole beautiful moment but then Robin-”

“Eddie,” Steve interrupted, laughing. Eddie’s jaw dropped, and then he facepalmed. 

“Oh my god I totally just said it without meaning to,” he said. “I’ve been holding out for WEEKS and -”

“You’ve loved me for weeks?” Steve asked, touched. 

“Well, yeah,” Eddie replied. “Duh.” His eyes bugged out on that last word, his voice taking on a goofy, boyish cadence. Steve smiled.

“You’re so ridiculous,” he said, shaking his head. “And I love you too.”

“Yeah?” Eddie asked, grinning.

“Duh,” Steve replied, attempting to mimic Eddie’s response from before. “Robin didn’t ruin your big plan, by the way. That was all you.” Eddie chuckled.

“You still love me though,” he said. Steve nodded, and then they were kissing. 

I’ll stop the world and melt with you.

Yeah. That song pretty much said it all.

Everything felt just right🌹

-------------------

Check out my Masterlist for other fics/content!

@paintballkid711 @abraca-fxckyou @allbimyself26 @jellybabiesforall @allbymyselfexceptformycactus @justaloadofgarbage-blog @alliemunsonsstuff @undreamingnscatworld @hobbitnarwhal @calivanus @wreckmyplans-thatsmyman @antheia @goodolefashionedloverboi @lillemilly @missmagillicuddy @gamerdano @menamesniall @eyeslikewildflowers111 @callmesirkay @stringischeese @eds-trashmouth @mnl-enuh @redfreckledwolf @itsanarrum @soulsofstarsliveinyourveins @stevesbipanic @momotonescreaming @aryakanojiaa @wrenisflying @comicmadlover @lilacrobin @itch-my-b0nez @anonymousbandgirl @disastardly @dangdirtydemons @daisyellsong @val-from-lawrence @starryeyedpoet17 @taikawaiteatea @clumsiluni @hollysimone @swimmingbirdrunningrock @witchofhawkins @steddiegarbage @suddenlyinlove @ricekristytreaty @eddielives1986 @bunnyweasley23 @thefailcollection @ppunkpuppyy @bestwifehaver @httpsphynx @irregular-child @skjachukson @deadfromtheneckdown

[ifyouseekay468]

what do YOU personally think the teenagers (mcr) lyrics are about my friend ? like i keep thinking about them but im not sure im going somewhere

okay, ive answered this ask twice on mobile and each time my phone deleted it, so here I go, the FINAL version of this post

It's been a hot minute since I listened to teenagers so I decided to do a quick run-through of the lyrics, and while Gerard&Co were raised catholic the lyrics seem to REEK of protestant trauma, so that's what I'll be going off of, but I'm pretty sure the two denominations overlap here. The first verse is about kids in youth group, Christian GirlsTM especially, who are put there to pressure you into being "normal" into "cleaning you up with the lies in the book" (bible), although the pastor is the one giving the teaching THESE are the people who will get you to BELIEVE, who will get you to lie to yourself, who will get you to church camps that on some level utilize brainwashing techniques, and will DESTROY you with the idea that you're "Just one of them, and just need to change everything about yourself and fake your way through every last sermon to be just a part of the gang",

The part about sleeping with a gun and keeping an eye on you is about two things: one, about the idea that God can see all your thoughts, that THINKING about "sin" (ie; fantasizing about sex) is as bad as COMMITTING sin (which is fucked up entirely on its own because fantasy is SO FUCKING DIFFERENT FROM REALITY and that is a CRUCIAL aspect of sexual expression in order to safely engage in sex), AND the fact that these kids will pretend to be your friend, will prod you into doing things with them, into telling them things about yourself all the while making you feel like "part of the group" when really they're just blabbing either to religious leaders, or are ostracizing you and bullying you behind your back.

"The drugs never work"

This in my opinion points to the fact that this song is specifically about being QUEER in a christian culture. It is common for trans people to turn to drugs or psychedelics in an area that has little to no access to gender affirming care, or acceptance because they both change reality and disconnect one from the body that is causing their dysphoria. It can also help burn away the guilt, so to speak.

The methods of keeping you clean is about two things: one, about purity culture, no smoking, no drinking, no friends who drink, no sex, no porn, no masturbation, no impure thoughts. The second, is the way they're able to subtly manipulate you into hiding yourself, into lying to yourself, into forcing yourself to the point of death into being cishet. They're keeping you clean not just from the vices of addiction, but the vices of the flesh, the vice you can't escape because it's a part of you from the day youre born. On a darker note, this could also be referring to c*nversion th*rapy, given this second interpretation of the lyrics

"Ripping your head and aspirations to shreds," Is again about two things in my opinion: both the idea of "losing yourself to God's will" that usually leads one to losing their identity and getting depression and fucked up mental health, and the "shift" that happens at church when you reach a certain age. You know the kind, right? You're four years old, and church is FUN! You get to go to this big room and sing and dance on stage with all your friends! You get to play GAMES! You get to talk to the ~cool teenagers~ who are ~Just like you~ and ~think youre a "cool kid"~, you have ~best friends~ who will be with you like Jesus and the 12! but then, one day, something happens, something SHIFTS. maybe the Sunday school teacher leaves, maybe there's a new family at church, maybe the church changes buildings. Maybe none of that has to do with any of it, all you know is that now things are forever different. Church isn't fun anymore. The kids classes are repetitive, they're bribing you into memorizing bible verses with money, they DONT reward critical thinking or analysis, but they do call you smart, that's because they dont want SMART kids they want OBEDIANT ones. You have no choice but to stat going to REAL church. Suddenly, your best friends are not your best friends. Suddenly they're avoiding you. Suddenly they're lying to you. Suddenly you're too... well they don't know the word yet but "gay" for them...

"Teenagers scare the living shit out of me"

This is what youth group does to you, it isolates you from your entire generation because there are few people your age and a whole lot older than you, and everyone is so much DIFFERENT from you for some reason, but neither of you know why, not yet anyways. This makes you distance yourself from teenagers, because you can't SEE yourself as a teenager, because youre nothing like other teenagers.

"They could care less as long as someone will bleed,"

This is the martyr complex that permeates youth culture like the smell of wine, the problem? these kids love to make a show of themselves and their martyrdom, but they're unwilling to martyr themselves, so what do they do? They throw someone else to the wolves and take the glory. They ostracize and eliminate the unique in the name of preserving their faith. They convert and convert and god help anyone who doesn't want to convert.

"So darken your clothes and strike a violent pose"

This is about deconversion, how the moment you leave the church you never want to see another cross till the day you die, that you want to avoid christians of all costs because you don't want them To drag you back into the pit that devoured you. So you do anything and everything you can to make yourself repulsive to Christians, which actually coincides with your indulgence of mundane activities previously considered as "sin"

"Maybe they'll leave you alone but not me,"

There's a different between a cishet ex Christian and a queer ex christian, and that difference is that a cishet atheist is more likely to be left alone than a queer one, especially a queer one whose whole demeanor screams "Christians be gone," that shit is like... it summons christians faster than free winter jam tickets! They swarm to you frothing at the mouth with holy water waiting to either convert you or exorcise you into purity, depends on if you want them or not. Again, you don't even have to be OPENLY gay, they can TRACK this shit. it's like fucking... INSTINCT or something.

"The boys and girls in the clique, the awful names that they stick, you're never gonna fit in much kid,"

as alluded to above, this lyric is about how, even from a young age, BEFORE youth group, this toxic culture kind of develops. ESPECIALLY around christian girls. They don't have the vulgarity of slurs, but they can make up for it with slang like "tomboy" "nancyboy" "too boyish" "a sissy" "Weird" etc, youre NEVER going to fit in, because the moment that "shift", from fun games and songs to Real Church, occurs, you have a target on your back.

"But if youre troubled and hurt what you got under your shirt will make them pay for the things that they did,"

This is probably a gun. But that's a tad too boring for my taste. If you were raised protestant you KNOW that being an ex protestant, after the craziness of evangelicalism, you would not hesitate to burn down your old church. It could be a secret tattoo, top surgery scars, hell maybe even nipple clamps. Whatever it is, it's symbolic of revenge. I know that anytime I wore my labrys necklace to church I would always hide it under my shirt. I hid books and CDs under there too. Again, it's about revenge, it's about breaking free, gun or no gun, the point is getting out and getting back at them.

and thats pretty much my take on the song. Again, this is not about artist intent this is just what the lyrics reminded ME of personally (as you can see from the over biographical bullshit I wrote), I'm always open to contradicting interpretations though as I always have like 2+ interpretations of a song or book! I never really saw the song through the lens of youth group specifically but when I went over the lyrics again in retrospect it all seemed to really click (pun not intended) well! Thanks for the ask!

[chronicallyblogged]

Mass wasn't sitting with me right so I shut it off half way through. I love the more radical Catholics (especially the old ladies who always have curly white hair for some reason) but the general vibe of it isn't good. The music is dissociation fuel. It also feels like they just switch between begging god not to nerf them and telling god he's the prettiest belle at the ball. Its all very self serving. If other people are involved its like in a weird shaming savior complex way. I get the desire behind wanting to focus on saving yourself but I feel like if there's a situation where you are going to be caught doing that its going to be the situation with God. I did however remember I liked a sermon done by a different church. That group was to friendly and it was too much to fast so I didn't stick with them but it encouraged me to look for more. I found a church nearby made by queer people for queer people that had a stream I could make. It was really good! The music had a more engaging beat. I could actually stay focused enough to tell what they were singing about. They had a slide show of some of the church members and I was surprised to see it was diverse. The group singing was also diverse. All the churches I went to only had white people. That made me hopeful that this place would be a more welcoming place. They actually applied scripture to real life events. They are clearly engaged in promoting social justice and there sites show multiple programs including one where they turn their building into a shelter. When providing examples of glory they used a transgender man's transition. Which I have never heard anyone outside of myself do that! Overall it was a pleasant experience and not once did they mention needing gods mercy which was nice. I think I may return.

[lordendsavior]

In the latest episode of HBO’s new NSFW teen drama Euphoria, there was sex scene between Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson. Well, kinda. One of the characters in the show, Kat (played by Barbie Ferreira), is famous online for writing One Direction fan fiction, specifically about Larry Stylinson, the name given to the theory that Styles and Tomlinson were, in fact, lovers. The sex scene in the episode actually comprised of versions of the two former boyband members in an animated scene lifted from one of this character’s stories. It’s unfortunate that the animation left Styles looking a little like Lord Voldemort and Tomlinson like a sweaty teenage boy. 

But while that aspect of the show might not have been real, the conspiracy of Larry Stylinson very much is. Since One Direction were launched off the back of The X Factor in 2010, Tomlinson and Styles have been dogged by rumours that they are embroiled in a love affair. On Tumblr – a breeding ground for fan theories, fan art, fan videos and fan fiction – fans would collect GIFs, images and videos of the pair that “proved” that they were in a relationship. A lingering glance was decoded as a lustful stare, the brush of knees during an interview a sign of a secret intimacy. These in turn would mutate into smutty fan fiction about the pair, where these unspoken sexual wants could play out in full explicit glory.

In the tradition of Bennifer and Brangelina, their names, like their desires, were brought together for the portmaneu Larry Stylinson. Shipping them – the act of wanting two people to be together romantically – became a way of life for some fans. To this day, these fans, known as Larries, are unwavering in their belief, love and support of Larry Stylinson.

The same cannot be said for Louis Tomlinson. For nearly nine years, he has been dogged by rumours and speculation about his relationship with Styles. This latest outing of Larry in Euphoria is just another example of the theory’s pervasiveness. After the scene aired, some fans on Twitter messaged Tomlinson to see if he had been consulted about the scene. His reply was telling. “I can categorically say that I was not contacted nor did I approve it,” he wrote.

For years, Tomlinson has categorically denied that Larry is real. In 2012  he responded to a fan stating that “Larry is the biggest load of b——- I’ve ever heard”, and in a 2017 interview with The Sun, the Doncaster-born singer said that he found the rumours disrespectful of his relationships with women and shared how it had also affected his friendship with Styles. “It took away the vibe you get off anyone. It made everything, I think on both fences, a little bit more unapproachable,” he revealed. “I think it shows that it was never anything real, if I can use that word.”

The decision to include the animated Larry sex scene in Euphoria has provied divisive. On Twitter, One Direction fans have dubbed it “disrespectful”, “vile” and an “embarrassment”. Even self-professed Larries called out the scene and some fans went so far as to start a Change.org petition to have the scene removed from the episode. (At the time of writing it has over nearly 17,000 signatures.)

The fandom’s rejection of Larry, at first, seems hypocritical. How can the very people who have spent years perpetuating the narrative that Tomlinson and Styles are romantically linked show annoyance when that same narrative gets utilised in wider media? However, fandom, specifically fan fiction, is a contradictory and confusing beast. The thing is, Larry Stylinson is bigger than the two boyband members at its core. Their supposed romantic relationship really has nothing to do with them at all.

To give a brief history of fan fiction, the medium, while it always existed in some form, came to prominence in the 1970s in fanzines for the TV show Star Trek. Then known as slash fiction (the slash refers to the forward slash that divide the two characters, for example “Kirk/Spock”), these early writings reexamined scenes within Star Trek episodes where it appeared that there was coded queer behaviour, language or sexual tension. A chance meeting on the bridge of the USS Enterprise could result in steamy sex behind a computer console. A violent clash with a Klingon that left either Spock/Kirk injured, may end with a restorative tryst in a hospital wing.

As fan communities evolved from zines to online forums, so fan fiction became more widely accessible. Forums gave birth to sites like fanfiction.net and archiveofourown.org, where every intellectual property from Harry Potter to Bob the Builder was free game. And not every story written was sexual, either. Many fan fictions, while romantic in nature, kept their plots suitable for all ages. They also mainly took fictional characters and queered formerly heteronormative (or platonic) senarios.

Incorporating of real people – celebrities, public figures, popstars, actors, artists – into these stories propagated during this online boom of fan fanction. Portals like nifty.org had dedicated sections for celebrity fan fiction, while sites like Wattpad, a sort of social media site for writers to share their work, filled with stories about famous people. During One Direction’s imperial phase, Wattpad especially became a hive of 1D fan fiction.

And not all of it was slash fiction, either. Anna Todd’s popular YA novel After, which became a movie this year, had its beginnings as One Direction fan fiction on Wattpad. That story featured a heterosexual relationship. Her literary success follows in the footsteps of EL James, whose Twilight fan fiction was repackaged as 50 Shades of Grey.

Nevertheless, it’s fair to say that much fan fiction, smutty or not, specifically draws on queer narratives. The reasons for this are multi-faceted. Demographically, fan fiction is predominantly written by women. In the case of Spock and Kirk, it has been argued by academics that in queering their relationship, women were able to carve out safe sexual spaces in the world of fiction away from the dominant glare of patriarchal sexuality.

According to fandom academic Camille Bacon-Smith, the fact that the gender of the characters was the same allowed women to reconstruct men without the toxicity of masculinity. The American writer Joanna Russ added to this, suggesting that in this safe space, women were able to explore their fantasies outside the confines of heteropatriarchal normalcy.

In fact, Constance Penley, a professor of Film & Media Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, wrote in her book Nasa/Trek Popular Science and Sex in America that the gender of the characters was irrelevant. The act of having characters acknowledge their homosexual desires, she argued, was a metaphorical one, grounded in a desire to change “oppressive sexual roles”.

Still, exploring sexual desire with fictional characters doesn’t feel like an ethical problem. Neither, really, do private fantasies about real people. But fan fiction takes those private fantasies and makes them public. If authors like JK Rowling and Annie Proulx (Brokeback Mountain) take umbrage with fans writing their own stories using their made up characters, how do real people feel about having their lives dissected and fictionalised for entertainment?

The problem is the blurred line between celebrity and the human being. As celebrity’s lives playout on websites, television and physical media, their real life stories – often fabricated for headlines or sales – become a sport. There’s a twisted sense of ownership over these people. The public, as a throbbing and beating entity, made them famous. Their payment is their lives. The boundaries begin to disappear, and these human beings become characters in a soap opera. The internet, which its unending ocean of content, only helps to conjure more moments that fans can decode or adapt for their fics.

The implications of this are different for everyone. Stars like Benedict Cumberbatch and Andrew Scott, who played Sherlock Holmes and Moriarty respectively in the BBC’s cult favourite Sherlock, take the fictionalised versions of their lives in their stride. In an interview with MTV, Cumberbatch, while acknowledging that he found some of the racier stories weird, called it “flattering”. Daniel Radcliff and James McAvoy also seemed to be able to find the humour in it (although, again, acknowledging that they find it “really weird"). There’s also those who just outright ignore that this phenomenon exists.

Harry Styles, despite being one half of Larry Stylinson, has only ever alluded to it once. After the release of his debut solo album, fans speculated that the track Sweet Creature was about Tomlinson. In an interview with a radio station, Styles said: “I think people are always gonna speculate what songs are about, and I don’t think I’d ever want to tell anyone that they’re wrong for feeling what they feel about a song. Even when they’re not necessarily right. But I think if you really listen to the lyrics, I think you can work out if it’s really about that or not, and I would lean towards no.”

However, this level of ambivalence isn’t always easy. In a recent interview with British GQ, Taron Egerton expressed his discomfort with people writing fan fiction about him. “I don’t know why people think I’d want to see that,” he said. “I don’t love it at all.”

It seems that Louis Tomlinson exists firmly in this camp. And unlike these other celebrities, the ship he was involved in evolved into a full blown conspiracy theory. Fans accused management of keeping his and Styles’s relationship a secret. Paparazzi pictures, performances, interviews, press cuttings, tweets and Instagram posts were dissected for clues that the pair were linked. Tomlinson and Styles were bombarded on Twitter by fans, the first comment under every post on social media almost always being “Larry is real”. That level of scrutiny would have been difficult for anyone, but for a teenager progressing into young adulthood it was unbearable.

What’s debatable is whether any of these fans and their libraries of “proof” and “receipts” actually believe that Larry Stylinson is real or whether shipping them is just an extension of their fan fiction fantasies. For the millions of One Direction fans, the members of the group, while clearly real people, were also mythic, so far removed from their realities that they were almost imaginary.

Anyone who has ever truly obsessed over a band or musician can understand that this distance between true human interaction incubates a need to develop an alternative form of intimacy, be it through listening religiously to their music, attending concerts or cooking up fantasies.

And because of the inequalities in knowledge between celebrities and non-celebrities, where we know everything about them and they know nothing about us, these fantasies, and in turn our perceptions of them, become skewered. This mutation is the perfect breeding ground for fan fiction and conspiracy theories as we attempt to fill in the blanks in our intimate knowledge of celebrity lives.

In the case of One Direction, whose fans were mainly young girls and gay boys, this fantasy  became a way to explore their own sexual wants and desires. It’s what the showrunner of Euphoria, Sam Levinson, told The Los Angeles Times he was trying to convey by having the character of Kat write 1D fan fiction.

The fact that the members of that boyband were in a similar age bracket only intensified things. Intimacy and a coarse understanding of celebrity saw the lines between fantasy and reality blur, accelerated and magnified by social media. In a way, it stopped being about Styles or Tomlinson and became about the fans, the community they’d found, a safe space to explore their desires in which those desires were often mirrored and supported by others in their community.

Does all that make real person fan fiction okay? Speaking to i-D, sex psychologist Jess O’Reilly, put it like this: “How might is make someone feel? How would their parents, partner(s), kids or friends feel about reading it? How would they feel if their friends and family read your work? How would you feel if someone published a similar story about you, your child, your partner, your best friend, your sibling or someone else you love?”

For Tomlinson, who has repeatedly shared the impact the sexual speculation had on his relationship with Styles, maybe a line has been crossed. His discomfort with the theories and fan fiction, along with countless other public figures who take issue with it, should be respected.

And, really, in the pantheon of fandoms, Larry Stylinson was its own perfect storm of burgeoning internet cultures, the proliferation of social media and cute boys singing pop bangers. The need to share sexual desires in fan fiction and, by extension, romantic celebrity conspiracy theories, feels more complicated than mere right or wrong, but rather an expanse of grey, ethical ambiguity.

It also feels too late for it to stop, too. Perhaps, as the role and makeup of what constitutes celebrity evolves, accepting fan fiction in its myriad of forms, like with gossip and rumours, is par for the course. Clearly, it’s up to the individual to figure out if they’re okay with that.

[thelearningheart]

A Funeral Celebration

Today, I went to my dear friends memorial/celebration/funeral. It was nontraditional, you see. His parents would not allow his friends to attend. They published his death the night after the funeral. I am grateful that another one of his friends had the brilliant idea to have this ceremony for him. I had not given thought to an idea close to it. 

The ceremony was quaint and sweet. I guess bittersweet. I am happy about the turn out, but I honestly expected more. People are very strange about the way they hold false grudges and earthly conflicts in their hearts even after the death of a loved one. It is known that you can love a person from a distance, but I felt he deserved a larger crowd of family to give collective respects. Those that did not show probably had reasons of their own.  I did not sleep until the sun began to rise this morning with the party only being a few hours away. I fell asleep and woke far later than I hoped to. I took a quick shower and hopped into my car, then endured the 45 minute drive to the memorial. When I got there, I dried my eyes with the sleeves of my thick blue sweater and stepped into a large muddy puddle, then looked up to the sky to appreciate the irony of the gray and cold sky perfect for a funeral. It was lightly sprinkling and trying to rain the entire way there. I told myself as I approached the building,” Alright, this is it. Stop crying and get your head on straight. We are going into public with people around.”

I arrived almost an hour late, but just in time. People were very quite and not talking. Occasionally, someone would speak up and talk about him with a 30 second pause between people. My god, those pauses felt like lifetimes.  After a while, people began making more jokes and it became light-hearted. I am grateful for this because I was crying on the inside and it was slowly seeping out of my eyes, but the jokes made it more tolerable. In those moments, I learned that it is important to breathe properly. You have to intentionally breathe so you do not drown in an sea of your tears and turmoil. 

The service continued. It was very informal. I loved it. Everyone was sitting around like it was just a coffee shop and we were having some group chat. Like I said  before, they were telling jokes and talking about the good times. All I wanted to do was cry for David. I wanted to allow myself to cry the tears I had not before. I did. I gently let the tears slip out of my eyes. They warmed my cheeks and throat.  Eventually, someone went out for a smoke break. An unbelievable amount of David’s friends smoked. I might say one or two people out of twenty did not. I was glad, because I intended on chain smoking and apparently they did too. We smoked and talked. I met very cool people that had heavy heart as I did. We shared our stories and our love for our fallen friend.

We all decided that we were going to drive to the cemetery were his parents laid his body to rest. In our vehicles we went. 

It was kind of touching that drove in a straight line like a procession would at a normal funeral. It is funny that his funeral went down like this because his entire life was outside the realm of normal. There was no normalcy and this includes his funeral. Mind you, its still sprinkling, cold, and gray. These people drove from Florida, Maryland, North Carolina, and all over to give David collective respects all the way down to southeast Alabama. 

As we were driving together, I look at the cars in front of me and the one behind me full of gratitude for the ones who came. We pulled into the Malvern Baptist Church parking lot. I, then, realized it was Sunday and that the regular church services were happening, so that was a bit off-putting, but we continued. Actually, I think I might have been the only one to bring attention to it and when mentioned there was a slight draft of fear, most likely because we are in the bible belt and queer people and weird people have had hate crimes constantly be committed on them, especially in the south.

We all walked around the cemetery trying to find David’s grave. Using context clue like, the grave being new and his family name, we found a new grave, the only one of its kind, covered in red dirt where plastic roses with black veins sat. We kind of stood around for moment slowly talking. Scott decided it was a great time for a collective cigarette smoke for David. We all pulled out cigarettes to smoke, sharing them with the ones who didn’t. We were bound together in ceremony just for our friend. I think he would have been satisfied with the turn out. We played music for him and for us to remember the good days and memories. Eventually, people needed to leave, so we slowly walked to our vehicles, gave each other warm hugs, and planned for another time. 

R.I.P. David Hawkins Forever 31, hopefully in the afterlife he can pick a better age than that. Lol Much love and good luck to you. I hope you leave us sooner rather than later and don’t linger around here long. Pass on with glory and a great ass. 

[gleekto]

One Night Love Affair (23/24)

Summary:  Kurt and Blaine never met in high school. They each finally make it to college, out of Ohio, to New York City - where they won’t be the only gay kid in the state. So when they meet at the first Queer NYADA mixer of the year in their freshman year of college, eager and hopeful has to be trumped by playing it cool (because whatever). Things move too fast (no big, it’s cool), and they’re left with pretending like it’s nothing (because everyone hooks up  - so what?).

One night and its aftermath.

One Night Love Affair

Athlete, Bury, Camera, Paper, Exclude, Feed, Gradual, House, Incident, Joke, Kidnap, Language, Momentum, Negligence, Orange, Pledge, Quantity, Realism, Stay, Transaction, Understand, Vegetarian

Part 23: Wire

By the time Friday rolls around, the chosen night for their first date, Kurt has already spent two nights, six lunch times, and four cafeteria dinners with Blaine. And they were even caught holding hands in Apples’ practice. In Kurt’s defense, they were not actually holding hands. They were sitting in the auditorium seats while Adam worked with the sopranos up at the front, and so what if their pinkies happened to overlap on the edges of their chairs? That’s hardly making out in public. Though by the way Jenny and Sarah squealed, you’d think they were sopranos too. Anyways, Kurt was feeling pretty good about the whole thing.

“We don’t really need a first date, you know. I mean, I think we’re kind of already - you know.” Kurt won’t be the one to put a label on it. But they don’t really need a first date.

“Of course we do,” Blaine smiles at him over their cafeteria french fries and squeezes his thigh under the table. “What kind of a boyfriend do you think I am?” Blaine obviously has no such qualms. But Kurt isn’t arguing.

So on Friday evening, Kurt puts on his tightest skinny jeans, an amazing cream diagonal cut half sweater and red button down underneath to complete the outfit. And his hair is perfection. As always.  “I love your style,” Blaine says when he sizes him up as they meet in the lobby of Kurt’s dorm. 

“Thank you,” Kurt smiles mischieviously. “Though I’m warning you, removing these jeans may be a tall order later on.”

“I’m up for the challenge,” Blaine smirks. Kurt’s sure he is. 

Blaine planned the evening. The Rent movie is playing at the campus rep theatre which Kurt agrees is perfect serendipity. They both saw the community theatre production in Lima years ago - where they might have met, but they didn’t. They talked about it on the night they actually met more than a month ago -  where they could have started something, but they didn’t. And now it’s here to ring in the actual beginning of something - which it isn’t. But they can call it their first date anyways.

“The theme is,” Blaine starts as they make their way into the theatre. “High school dates that never happened are better in college anyways.” Blaine planned a theme. Of course he did. They sit down, a popcorn between them to share. A movie, shared popcorn, a pizza dinner afterwards. A perfect cliche.

“Does that mean you’ve told your friends you’re going to try to make it to second base in the backseat of your parents’ car later?” Kurt whispers as the lights go down.

Blaine lets his fingers linger over Kurt’s in the buttery bag. “Third base. In your bed. All night.” Blaine breathes in his ear.

“What a player. I’m sure they’ll be impressed.” Kurt is impressed. The date is simple and obvious and appropriate to starving student budgets. But also Rent and the very thing they couldn’t have in high school - A date in all its ordinary glory. They hold hands the whole time. They sing Seasons of Love quietly under their breaths. And when Collins and Angel duet, Blaine leans over and kisses Kurt’s cheek. Completely corny but Kurt will never begrudge Blaine romantic sentimentality. He may be somewhat of a silly romantic himself.

They’re starving by the time they arrive at the pizza restaurant and Blaine, of course, thought ahead to make a reservation. “It’s Friday night on campus - we’d never get a seat otherwise,” Blaine explains and Kurt is impressed again. The waiter escorts them to their table and there is one long stemmed red rose placed at his seat. Very impressed.  

“You planned this?”

“That or the waiter is trying to steal my date,” Blaine dismisses in perfect false modesty. Kurt picks up the rose and smiles.

“I’ll have to tell him I’m taken.” Kurt is sure they must look like lovestruck teenagers with the way they’re staring at each other. Also on theme.

“Blaine! Kurt!” They’re snapped out of their puppy eyes’ daze to Sam’s excited voice as he walks in to the restaurant.

“It’s Sam,” Kurt says to Blaine questioningly.

“It is,” Blaine says back, equally confused. The door opens again. “And Tina. And Jen. And Scott. Look it’s half my dorm floor.” Blaine’s eyes go wide and apologetic.

“Did they wire tap you or something?” Kurt whispers under his breath.

“This is such a coincidence, guys! We can join you.” Sam takes up the table beside Blaine, who looks stricken, but Kurt laughs. Perhaps the campus pizza place isn’t a super secret hideaway.

“Yeah, join us. For sure,” Kurt smiles at Sam genuinely and Blaine gives him a look.

“Wait. You guys aren’t - I mean, I know you guys are - But this isn’t like a special pizza or something, is it?” Sam does clue in eventually.

“Well we were on a date,” Blaine says pointedly.

“We were,” Kurt affirms but mouths to Blaine “It’s okay.” He’s surprised that he means it.

“Shit. I am sorry, dude-Oh my god, there’s even a rose,” Sam starts.

“It’s okay. You can stay, really,” Blaine says to Sam but he’s looking at Kurt for confirmation.

“I’ve already got my rose, anyways,” Kurt nods. “And this way I can get all the inside scoop about Blaine.”

“Yes!” Tina claps her hands as she pulls up beside Kurt. “Has he told you that he flosses three times a day?” Tina stage whispers. Blaine rolls his eyes.

“That is a lot,” Kurt nods at Blaine.

“Are you complaining about my impeccable oral hygiene?” Blaine pings his straw wrapper at Kurt. who’s enjoying Blaine’s dorm mates’ enthusiasm for his quirks. Which is really enthusiasm for Blaine. Which Kurt can definitely appreciate.

“He plays piano at midnight.”

“He has a step stool to reach the top shelf in the closet.”

“He keeps a stash of juice boxes.”

“But you know what’s super weird?” Tina asks Kurt. “He somehow turns from dapper grandpa with admittedly classically handsome looks to like a freakishly sexy rock star when he sings.” 

Kurt smirks at Blaine knowingly. “You’ll have to perform for me one day.”

“Isn’t that how I won you over in the first place?”

“I think it was in the second place. But yes.” Blaine takes Kurt’s hand over the salt and pepper shakers and interlaces their fingers.

“Oh!” Sam slaps the table. “He has 43 bowties. 43.”

“43?” Kurt repeats and Blaine shrugs innocently.

“Maybe.”

After a dinner of too much perfectly greasy pizza and a reasonable amount of funny stories about Blaine (and a few about Sam too, for good measure), Blaine manages to politely decline going out drinking in favor of ‘turning in early’. 

“I know what that means,” Sam winks. 

“Genius,” Kurt says under his breath and Blaine laughs.

“Don’t wait up, Sam,” Blaine pats him on the shoulder, finally sending him on his merry way.

“You sure you didn’t mind all my friends crashing our date?” Blaine asks him genuinely. “I may have planned the rose, but the extra guests were not on the agenda.”

“It was perfect,” Kurt links his arm through Blaine’s as they make their way back to his dorm. “Group dates are very high school. Fits the theme.”

“That’s true,” Blaine agrees. “But still, it was meant to be an actual date.”

Kurt shakes his head. “There will be more dates. I believe you have another 42 bowties to show me, anyways.”

[stacksetfacts]

I got a hold of an ARC for this most excellent book at ALA Midwinter this January, and was excited to read it -- especially after sitting in on a panel hosted by @penguinteen’s new imprint Kokila, that focuses on presenting works by folks on the margins. 

And after finishing it this morning, I decided to do something I haven’t done before: write a review of it. I originally posted it at the link above, but here it is in its full text glory. 

I’m not sure where to start with this because there’s so much about Patron Saints of Nothing to love: do I mention how authentically-but-not-tropely teenager-like Jay, the protagonist, feels? Should I talk about how the book makes a real-world event, happening right now, become meaningful and accessible to readers across the ocean in ways that journalism can’t? What about the fact that every person in this story (it feels weird for me to call them characters at this point) gets an opportunity to live and tell a story that is as much their own as it is the story of millions of people? Selfishly, the queer in me wants to talk about the representation, but I think it might be best to start somewhere else.

Randy Ribay wrote a book that is a lot of things: loving, illuminating, excellent — but the word I keep circling back to is important. I think that’s why it’s hard to decide where to start – there’s no single thing about the book that makes it important; it’s the book in its entirety, and how all the different elements I mentioned above – and more – feed off of and into each other.

The story is about the aforementioned Jay (short for Jason) Reguero, a teenaged Filipino-American boy who lives in Michigan with his Filipino dad and his white mom. From the outset, you feel like you already know Jay: he’s the one brown kid who you know of from school but who you don’t really know. This is partly because you’ve noticed him for what makes him different, and without realizing it you decide you know something about him because of that; but it’s also partly because he’s mastered the skill of fitting in just enough to stay out of the general consciousness as a way to deal with the other-ness he feels, and to stay safe in his school.

Mind you, the secret that nearly every teenager learns, but only once they’re well past their teens, is that everyone in high school has that same sense of desperation in wanting not to be noticed, because different is dangerous. But Jay shows readers another part of that, that a lot of us miss if we aren’t visibly a minority ourselves: white readers get a taste of what it’s like to want to fit in, but to have something about you that is overtly and immutably different. Jay can wear the same clothes, speak the same language, aspire to the same image of adult success, but he’ll still, always, be (and be seen as) Filipino-American – for better or worse, depending on who you ask.

This kind of otherness is powerful and permeating, and the way Ribay tackles it in Nothing is kind but also unflinching. There’s an interaction early on between Jay and his best friend that highlights the pain of it – when his friend starts a conversation with the dreaded, “promise me you won’t get offended,” the conversation goes exactly where you expect it to. But it all has to be said, and said in a way that is as explicit as it can be, especially for a novel that’s written for young readers: there’s a problem with whiteness being the default, and there’s a problem with assuming that things that differ from the norm is bad, and while someone can be as well-meaning as the day is long, sometimes people are perfectly justified in their anger at what you thought was a compliment. But it also shows that people can forgive, even if that forgiveness doesn’t come in that moment, or that day, or even that week. This interaction, for all its cringeworthiness, is also genuine and human and important.

This exploration of otherness gets explored from the other side of Jay’s identity as well when he travels to the Philippines to investigate his cousin’s death (the central plot of the book). I want to acknowledge here that this particular plot point is probably the only aspect of the book that I was skeptical of before I started reading Nothing. There’s a tendency I’ve found in YA lit to give the protagonists “diet superpowers,” that is, to make them remarkable in ways that are just past what one could realistically expect from a character their age. And while I don’t think that’s a problem – if it inspires young people to be more than they can, good! – it also feels a little cheap. So when reading the synopsis for Nothing, I felt a little skeptical reading that a seventeen-year-old was going to the Philippines to investigate his cousin’s death.

Fortunately, I was reassured early into the novel (and then very very nervous for him given the task he was tackling) (oh no my sweet Jay what are you getting yourself into) to find out that Jay’s… well, he’s very much a realistic seventeen-year-old, with no preternatural sleuthing skills to speak of. His time in the Philippines plays out realistically, and Ribay is kind enough to the reader and to Jay to make sure that he is looked after by a cast of characters who are believably competent, which gives Jay the space he needs to grow up quickly but authentically, given the circumstances. Disbelief happily not suspended!

During his time in the Philippines, the reader is given a chance to understand how painful being the other can be, which is so in line with Ribay’s dedication of the book: for the hyphenated. Although it’s touched on during his time home, once Jay lands in Manila the reader gets to see him grapple with the cost that he’s paid to try and fit in back home. Perhaps the biggest: Jay doesn’t speak Tagalog, one of the two national languages of the Philippines, and an overt marker to nearly everyone he comes in contact with that something about his identity doesn’t fit. We see how this recognition of his otherness plays out in his interactions variously with a customs agent, his family, and the folks he meets along the way, and I couldn’t help but wince for and with him each time someone else pointed at it. I think this is something that folks from mixed backgrounds intrinsically get, but is less obvious to others, and should be a core take-away for readers:

For the folks who exist on the margins – folks who straddle nationalities, or color lines, or various other identities, there’s immense pressure from both sides to fit into one identity or the other.

For some folks, I think the result is that one never gets to feel fully anything, and that can feel incredibly lonely. I hope that readers of Nothing pick that message up, and realize that they can be kind, and understanding, and try to hold space for the whole complexity of a person.

That last bit – recognizing that people are not simple things where a single label, or even two, can substitute for the whole-ness of their beings – is probably the biggest take-away of this book for me, and Ribay gets it across beautifully. The entire book lets the reader follow Jay’s journey from not just understanding himself as more than just a young man who’s going off to college because that’s what expected of him, but to understanding that the same thing applies to everyone around him. Every character, it seems, is introduced simply (justifiably so – Jay’s the narrator), but over the course of the book you learn that they are so much more than the handful of identity markers they get in the start.

That’s how people are in real life, and perhaps that’s why I think Patron Saints of Nothing is, above all, important. It’s important for others in the margins to read and see themselves reflected in art and the media – it lets them know they aren’t alone, they are worth telling stories about, and that someone else cares enough about them to put forth the effort. It’s also important for everyone else, because it gives anyone who reads it permission to feel and see aspects of themselves reflected in people they might not otherwise click with. The world always needs more empathy, but especially nowadays, it seems like we could go for a double helping.

Patron Saints of Nothing, by Randy Ribay, is slated for release in June 2019 by Kokila, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

[cryingovershance]

I haven't watched season 7 yet because exam season is here where I live and I've heard some pretty bad stuff about how the writers have shoved Keith into the spotlight once again, the LGBT rep and the game show episode with everyone calling Lance dumb and ??? Should I just skip a few episodes?? Are those important plot points?? Or were they just grinding everyone's face in the dirt this season??

(kay so i meant to answer this yesterday morning and then tumblr ATE MY REPLY and i couldnt get to it until now)

first off, i wanna say good luck on your exams!! good on you for focusing on your schoolwork!!!

as for the show... let me first preface this with the fact that, usually, whatever you’re imagining form what youve seen/been told, it’s worse than what the actual show’s content is. your imagination is scarier than a lot of things, if you let it be. 

that said..... (some spoilers ahead, though i guess you know of them, here is clarification)

keith is definitely The Only Main Character We Are Allowed To Care About once again. he is. it sucked. everyone was shoved a little to the side and, like every time he comes back around, all characters and their arcs actually regressed. so. 

BUT HE DID GET CALLED OUT FOR BEING A DICK A COUPLE TIMES. that was nice. but brief. so don’t get your heart set on it or anything.

for the LGBT.... we didn’t actually... get anything. if you belive in “word of god” (aka, one of the show people says its canon outside of the show and thats it), then... kinda, sure. but as for whats IN the show.... shiro and adam have a .3 second scene where they p much break up and its only implied that they were together in the first place. it’s nothing official, nothing to write home about. and seeing as this was rushed af and not mentioned at all during the rest of the show, i, personally, would not call it representation

(because, if you do call it rep, then one half of your only rep does die horrifically on screen some eps later. they said that it was to build the audience’s love for the people of earth and then show how bad the war is, but................................. sounds like backtracking to me, lmao)

okay straight up that game show episode was stupid AND meaningless. i wish i had skipped it. it drug on forever AND made fun of lance a LOT for no reason. LITERALLY NO ONE DEFENDED HIM

lance is torn down a LOT this season. its weird. and bad. are these people not his friends? do the show writers just hate him?

(it’s bad writing)

so the gameshow one is not an important plot point, except for the very end, i guess? if you just skip to them being in their lions again, you’ll get the two minutes of info thrown down and then a minicliff hanger thing. 

however, keith and his act can’t be avoided if you want to watch the show for the plot - which is even thinner than usual this season so.... okay. neither is the lance-bashing. if you skip the flashbacks, you can avoid adam entirely. (there are a few that are just shiro & keith bonding if you’re into that, but they’re also very, very keith centric)

i didn’t actually watch all of the show. i got up until they intro’d earth, skipped all the way to lance reuniting with his family, and dropped it. i don’t plan on watching the next season. they just dropped the ball too hard on this one. 

but i do know enough about the plot to basically know that it’s war.

(and that war is acceptable to be on a kid’s show, in all its horrifying glory and death, but even a mention of an official queer relationship, is.... not)

[i-am-very-very-tired]

Somewhere between Britney and Billie Eilish, liberated by social media and their direct relationship with fans, millennial and Gen Z women claimed the right to be complicated pop auteursRead all of the essays in the decade retrospective

📷 Laura Snapes Mon 25 Nov 2019 13.12 GMT 174

While Billie Eilish has reinvented pop with her hushed SoundCloud rap menace, creepy ASMR intimacy and chipper show tune melodies, there’s also something reassuringly comforting about her: as a teenage pop star, she has fulfilled her proper duty by confusing the hell out of adults. It’s largely down to her aesthetic: a funhouse Fred Durst; a one-woman model for the combined wares of Camden Market. Critics have tried to make sense of it, but when editorials praised Eilish’s “total lack of sexualisation”, she denounced them for “slut-shaming” her peers. “I don’t like that there’s this weird new world of supporting me by shaming people that may not want to dress like me.”To Gen Z’s Eilish, not yet 18, it is a weird new world. She and her millennial peers have grown up in a decade in which pop’s good girl/bad girl binary has collapsed into the moral void that once upheld it, resulting in a generation of young female stars savvy to how the expectation to be “respectable” and conform to adult ideas of how a role model for young fans should act – by an industry not known for its moral backbone – is a con. “It’s a lot harder to treat women the way they were treated in the 90s now, because you can get called out so easily on social media,” Fiona Apple – who knows about the simultaneous sexualisation and dismissal of young female musicians – said recently. “If somebody does something shitty nowadays, a 17-year-old singer can get on their social media and say, ‘Look what this fucker did! It’s fucked up.’”📷 Lunatics conquering the asylum ... the Spice Girls. Photograph: Tim Roney/Getty ImagesFemale musicians have been subject to conflicting moral standards for longer than Eilish has been alive. Madonna, Janet Jackson and TLC knew them well – but the concept of the pop “role model”, expected to set an example to kids, solidified when the Spice Girls became the first female act to be marketed at children. In the 70s and 80s, idols such as David Cassidy primed girls for a monogamous future. By comparison, the Spice Girls were lunatics conquering the asylum. But, given their fans’ youth – and the sponsors that used the band to reach them – they also had a duty of responsibility. Their real lives – the all-nighters and eating disorders – were hidden so effectively that Eilish, born in 2001, thought the band was made up, actors playing the roles of the group in Spiceworld: The Movie.In the late 90s, kid-pop became an industry unto itself: Smash Hits and Top of the Pops magazine pitched younger; CD:UK and America’s TRL aimed at Saturday-morning and after-school audiences; Simons Fuller and Cowell built empires. The scrappy Spice Girls preceded the cyborgian Britney, who was a far sleeker enterprise – until she wasn’t. She was pitched as a virgin: cruel branding that invited media prurience and set a time bomb counting down towards her inevitable downfall. Britney’s 2007 breakdown revealed the cost of living as a virtuous cypher and being expected to repress her womanhood to sell to American prudes. Her shaved head and aborted stints in rehab prompted industry handwringing, and so an illusion of the music business offering greater freedom and care for pop’s girls emerged in her wake. Advertisement Major labels abandoned the traditional two-albums-in bad-girl turn (a la Christina Aguilera’s Stripped). Social media-born artists such as Lily Allen and Kate Nash were swept into the system and framed as the gobby antithesis to their manicured pop peers – until their resistance to exactly the same kind of manipulation saw them cast aside. And if Kesha, Lady Gaga or Amy Winehouse burned out, their visible excesses would distract from any behind-the-scenes exploitation, inviting spectators to imagine that they brought it on themselves.📷 Reclaiming the hard-partying values of rock’s men ... Kesha. Photograph: PictureGroup / Rex FeaturesAt the dawn of the 2010s, social media surpassed its teen origins to become an adult concern, and an earnest fourth wave of activists brought feminism back to the mainstream. Like a rescued hatchling, it was in a

pathetic state to begin with – dominated by white voices that tediously wondered whether anything a woman did was automatically feminist. Is brushing your teeth with Jack Daniel’s feminist? Are meat dresses feminist? Is drunkenly stumbling through Camden feminist? Are butt implants feminist?Pop culture became the natural test site for these ideas – especially music, where a new wave of artists challenged this nascent, often misguided idealism. Kesha reclaimed the hard-partying values of rock’s men to embody a generation’s despair at seeing their futures obliterated by the recession. Lady Gaga questioned gender itself, as one writer in this paper put it, “re-queering a mainstream that had fallen back into heteronormative mundanity”. In a career-making verse on Kanye West’s Monster, Nicki Minaj annihilated her male peers and gloried in her sexualisation. MIA, infuriated by America’s hypocritical propriety, flipped off the Super Bowl and proved her point by incurring a $16.5m fine.📷 Infuriated by hypocritical propriety ... MIA gives America the middle finger during her Super Bowl performance in 2012. Photograph: Christopher Polk/Getty Images Advertisement As a former Disney star, Miley Cyrus stepped the furthest out of bounds. In 2008, aged 15, she had posed in a sheet for Vanity Fair. “MILEY’S SHAME,” screamed the New York Post. She apologised to her fans, “who I care so deeply about”. But in 2013, she torched her child-star image by writhing in her knickers on a wrecking ball, twerking against Robin Thicke, being flagrant about her drug use, appropriating African American culture while perpetuating racist stereotypes.Cyrus’s 2013 transformation bore the hallmarks of a breakdown – especially witnessed two years after the death of Amy Winehouse, who was then perceived as a victim of her own self-destruction. But Cyrus was largely intentional about her work (if, then, ignorant of her racism). She had waited until she was no longer employed by Disney to express herself. Earlier in her career, she said, she struggled to watch her peers. “I was so jealous of what everyone else got to do, because I didn’t get to truly be myself yet.” Despite apparently smoking massive amounts of weed herself, she didn’t want to tell kids to copy her. But she knew the power she offered her peers such as Ariana Grande, who that year left Nickelodeon to release her debut album. “I’m like, ‘Walk out with me right now and get this picture, and this will be the best thing that happens to you, because just you associating with me makes you a little less sweet.’”Pop did get a little less sweet. Sia and Tove Lo sang brazenly about using drugs to mask pain. Icona Pop’s I Love It reigned (“I crashed my car into a bridge / I watched and let it burn”) thanks to its inclusion on the soundtrack of Lena Dunham’s Girls. With its aimless characters and their ugly behaviour, the show mirrored pop’s retreat from aspirational sheen, and the culture’s growing obsession with “messy” women and “strong female characters”: flawed attempts to create new archetypes that rejected the expectation of girls behaving nicely.📷 An explicit rejection of role-model status ... Beyoncé performs at the Super Bowl in 2013. Photograph: Ezra Shaw/Getty ImagesA new cohort of young female and non-binary critics shifted the discussion around music: in 2015, when the documentary Amy was released, they questioned how Winehouse was perceived in death compared to Kurt Cobain. They also pushed aside the virgin/whore rivalries of old. In an earlier era, Beyoncé and Lana Del Rey might have been fashioned into nemeses, one sexualised and powerful, the other gothic and demure. Instead, their respective mid-decade self-mythologising showed that female musicians could be pop’s auteurs, not just the men in the wings. Advertisement Beyoncé’s self-titled 2013 album was an explicit rejection of her role-model status. She was 15 when Destiny’s Child released their debut album. “But now I’m in my 30s and those children that grew up listening to me have grown up,” she said in a behind-the-scenes video.

The responsibility she felt to them “stifled” her. “I felt like ... I could not express everything … I feel like I’ve earned the right to be me and express any and every side of myself.”It was the first of her albums to reveal the breadth of her inner life – the coexisting kinks, triumphs and insecurities, showing the complexity of black womanhood. The critic Soraya Nadia McDonald wrote: “Mixed in with songs about insecurity, grief, protest and the love she has for her child, Beyoncé manages to present her sexuality as a normal part of her life that deserves celebration.” “It doesn’t make you a bad mother. It doesn’t make black people look bad, and it doesn’t make you a bad feminist, either.” When Beyoncé emblazoned “FEMINIST” on stage at the 2014 MTV VMAs, she helped reclaim the word from middle-class white discourse.Like Beyoncé, Del Rey countered the idea that female pop stars were major-label puppets. She had struggled to make it as an indie artist but found a home at Polydor – a detail that caused detractors to question her authenticity. Her shaky debut SNL performance revealed the flaw in their thinking: if she was manufactured, wouldn’t she have been better drilled? Her project was potent, but startlingly unrefined. More intriguingly, she opposed fast-calcifying ideas about how feminist art should look: Del Rey’s lyrics revelled in submission and violence, in thrall to bad guys and glamour. It wasn’t feminist to want these things; but nor was it feminist to insist on the suppression of desire in the name of shiny empowerment.📷 Exposing industry machinations ... Azealia Banks at the Reading festival in 2013. Photograph: Simone Joyner/Getty Images Advertisement Del Rey’s lusts and designs were her own – pure female gaze – a hallmark of the defiant female pop stars to come. Rihanna said she was “completely not” a role model, a point driven home by the viscerally violent video for Bitch Better Have My Money. Lauren Mayberry of Scottish trio Chvrches refused to be singled out from her male bandmates and wrote searingly about the misogyny she faced online. Janelle Monáe and Solange rubbished the idea that R&B was the only lane open to young black women.They started revealing their business conflicts. In 2013, 21-year-old Sky Ferreira finally released her debut, six years after signing a $1m record deal. She was transparent about her paradoxical treatment: “They worked me to death, but when I wanted to input anything, it was like, ‘You’re a child, you don’t know what you’re talking about.’” When Capitol pulled funding for the album, she financed its completion: it was widely named an album of the year. Facing similar frustrations, rapper Angel Haze leaked her 2013 album, Dirty Gold, and Azealia Banks wasted no opportunity to expose industry machinations.The rise of Tumblr and SoundCloud put young artists in control of their own artistic identities, forging authentic fan relationships that labels couldn’t afford to mess with. Lorde was signed age 12, but her manager knew he had to follow her lead because she knew her audience better than he did. Halsey was already Tumblr-famous for her covers, hair colours and candour about her bisexuality and bipolar diagnosis when she posted her first original song in 2014. It received so much attention that the 19-year-old – who described herself as an “inconvenient woman” for everything she represented – signed to major label Astralwerks the following evening.A new type of fan arrived with them. The illusion of intimacy led to greater emotional investment – and with it, an expectation of accountability. Social media was being used to arbitrate social justice issues, giving long overdue platforms to marginalised voices, and establishing far more complex moral standards for pop stars than the executives who shilled Britney’s virginity could ever have imagined. In 2013, Your Fav Is Problematic began to highlight stars’ missteps: among Halsey’s 11 infractions were “sexualising Japanese culture” and allegedly falsifying her story about being “homeless”.Musicians, particularly of an

older guard, were unprepared. Lily Allen’s comeback single Hard Out Here, released in late 2013, satirised the impossible aesthetic standards expected of female musicians – a bold message undermined by the racist stereotypes she invoked to make her point: “Don’t need to shake my arse for you ’cause I’ve got a brain,” she sang, while black and Asian leotard-clad dancers twerked around her in the video. The backlash was swift. There was the sense of a balance tipping.📷 Refused to let terrorists suppress girls’ joy ... Ariana Grande at One Love Manchester, 4 June 2017. Photograph: Kevin Mazur/One Love Manchester/Getty Images Advertisement Over the decade, female pop stars steadily self-determined beyond the old limited archetypes. But the most dramatic identity shifts were still a product of adversity, women battling for control.In 2015, Ariana Grande provoked mild outcry when she got caught licking a doughnut she hadn’t paid for and declaring: “I hate America.” Two years later, a suicide bomber attacked her concert at Manchester Arena, leaving 22 dead. She went home to Florida in the aftermath, then returned to stage benefit concert One Love Manchester. A victim’s mother asked Grande to perform her raunchiest hits after the Daily Mail implied that the bomber had targeted the concert because of her sexualised aesthetic. So she did. By prioritising her mental health and refusing to let terrorists suppress girls’ joy and sexuality, she set a powerful example for fans that ran counter to the moralising of commentators such as Piers Morgan.Grande appeared to emerge from this tragedy – and the death of ex-boyfriend Mac Miller – with a renewed sense of what was important, and what really was not. Her next album, Sweetener, defiantly reclaimed happiness from trauma; she swiftly released another, Thank U, Next, abandoning traditional pop release patterns to work with a rapper’s spontaneity. “I just want to fucking talk to my fans and sing and write music and drop it the way these boys do,” she said.Kesha had helped instigate this decade of greater freedom for female musicians – or so it seemed until October 2014, when she sued producer Dr Luke, making allegations including sexual assault. (In spring 2016, a judge dismissed the case; Luke denies all allegations and is suing Kesha for defamation.) She claimed she was told she had to be “fun”, an image that Luke’s label intended to capitalise on, revealing how revelry could be just as confining as its prim counterpart. In 2017, she released Rainbow, her first album in five years. Addressing her trauma, it got the best reviews of her career – a response that also seemed to reveal something about the most digestible way for a female artist to exist. But her forthcoming album, High Road, pointedly returns to the recklessness of her first two records. “I don’t feel as if I’m beholden to be a tragedy just because I’ve gone through something that was tragic,” she said.Taylor Swift’s refusal to endorse a candidate in the 2016 election, and the fallout from a spat with Kanye West, saw her shred her image of nice-girl relatability with her 2017 heel-turn, Reputation. But she rebelled more meaningfully when she leveraged her profile to expose the music industry, alerting the public to otherwise opaque matters of ownership and compensation. She joined independent labels in the fight to make Apple Music pay artists for the free trial period it offered consumers. Earlier this year, she despaired at her former label, Big Machine, being bought – and the master recordings to her first six albums with it – by nemesis Scooter Braun, an option she claimed she was denied. Now signed to Universal, and the owner of her masters going forward, she hoped young musicians might learn from her “about how to better protect themselves in a negotiation”, she wrote. “You deserve to own the art you make.” Advertisement Swift’s formative politesse came from country music, an industry that emphasises deference to power and traditional gender roles. In 2015, consultant Keith Hill – using a bizarre metaphor about

salad – admitted that radio sidelined female musicians: they were then subject to endless questions about tomatogate, as if they had the power to fix it. But that blatant industry disregard freed female country artists to shuck off obligation and make whatever music they wanted. In recent years, Miranda Lambert, Ashley McBryde, Brandy Clark, Kacey Musgraves, Ashley Monroe, Maren Morris, Brandi Carlile and Margo Price have all creatively outstripped their male peers.📷 ‘Just me existing is revolutionary’ ... Lizzo. Photograph: Owen Sweeney/Invision/APTheir situation resonates beyond country: greater personal freedoms for female musicians haven’t equated to greater commercial success. Just because a wave of female pop acts have refused old industry ideals, that doesn’t mean control is consigned to the past. There will be young women enduring coercive music industry situations right now – whether manipulation or more serious abuse. Some may never meet those impossible standards, and fail to launch. Others may quietly endure years of repression before potentially finding their voice. There are high-profile female pop acts working today who control their work yet are still subject to grinding suggestions that they change to meet market demands, and noisy women from this decade who have been sidelined. The tropes of the self-actualised female pop star are so established that labels know how to reverse engineer “real” pop girls beholden to a script.But the emergence of a more holistic female star will make it harder for labels to shill substitutes. Their emotional openness has destroyed the stigma around mental health that was used to diminish female musicians as “mad” divas. Charli XCX said she would never have betrayed her vulnerabilities when she was starting out in her teens. “If I’m emotionally vulnerable,” she thought, “people won’t take me seriously … Now I just don’t care.” Robyn spent eight years following up her most successful record because she needed time to grieve and unpick the impact of her own teen stardom. Britney – who in 1999 told Rolling Stone, “I have no feelings at all” – this year cancelled her Las Vegas residency to prioritise her mental health. 📷 More to the floor: the decade the dancefloor was decolonised Read more Advertisement They’ve relentlessly countered the male gaze. Chris refused to simplify queerness for the mainstream; Kim Petras stood for “trans joy”; Rihanna challenged the idea of skinny as aspirational by creating inclusive fashion lines and candidly discussing her own shape. “Just me existing is revolutionary”, Lizzo has said, while Cardi B refused to let anyone use her past as a stripper undermine her legitimacy as a powerful political voice.Where unthinking messiness was valorised at the start of the decade, now imperfection only gets a pass as long as nobody else is getting hurt. This summer, Miley, now 26, apologised for the racial insensitivity of her Wrecking Ball era. Soon after, she posted striking tweets in response to rumours of her cheating on her husband. She admitted to having been hedonistic and unprofessional in her youth. But she swore she hadn’t cheated in her marriage. “I’ve grown up in front of you, but the bottom line is, I HAVE GROWN UP,” she wrote. (To a degree – not long after, she found herself called out again when she implied that queerness is a choice.)In their fallibility and resistance to commodification, the women who have defined this decade in pop look a lot more like role models than the corporate innocents sold to girls in the early millennium. They’re still learning, working with what they’ve got rather than submitting to what they’re told. “I don’t know what it feels like not to be a teenager,” Billie Eilish said recently. “But kids know more than adults.” … as you’re joining us today from South Africa, we have a small favour to ask. Tens of millions have placed their trust in the Guardian’s high-impact journalism since we started publishing 200 years ago, turning to us in moments of crisis, uncertainty, solidarity and hope. More than 1.5

million readers, from 180 countries, have recently taken the step to support us financially – keeping us open to all, and fiercely independent.With no shareholders or billionaire owner, we can set our own agenda and provide trustworthy journalism that’s free from commercial and political influence, offering a counterweight to the spread of misinformation. When it’s never mattered more, we can investigate and challenge without fear or favour.Unlike many others, Guardian journalism is available for everyone to read, regardless of what they can afford to pay. We do this because we believe in information equality. Greater numbers of people can keep track of global events, understand their impact on people and communities, and become inspired to take meaningful action.We aim to offer readers a comprehensive, international perspective on critical events shaping our world – from the Black Lives Matter movement, to the new American administration, Brexit, and the world's slow emergence from a global pandemic. We are committed to upholding our reputation for urgent, powerful reporting on the climate emergency, and made the decision to reject advertising from fossil fuel companies, divest from the oil and gas industries, and set a course to achieve net zero emissions by 2030.

[dillydedalus]

november reading

so with lockdown #2, my master’s thesis done & handed in etc, i just had absolutely nothing going on so this month so... lots of books. featuring Houses full of statues and birds, an AU of weimar berlin, and... the plague?

someone who will love you in all your damaged glory, raphael bob-waksberg (audio) actually listened to this last month! anyway even tho i forgot about it, i actually really liked it! it’s a collection of short stories, all about love in some way, most with a strange twist - a couple wants a small wedding but the MIL insists they have to at least sacrifice 5 goats to the stone god and have a shrieking chorus, or it’s hardly a real wedding, right? that kind of thing. i really liked these stories; they were fun, hopeful without being cheesy (mostly), and the audio production, with lots of actors reading the different stories was fun. 4/5

the driver’s seat, muriel spark man this novella is nasty, but in a good way - sharp, vicious, mean but so well executed. it’s also pretty hard to discuss without spoiling it & i do think one should go into this unspoiled. but it’s certainly a classic of the unhinged women genre, showing lise seemingly making herself as noticeable, irritating and off-putting as she can on a trip to an unnamed (probably italian) city. 3.5/5

the empress of salt and fortune, nghi vo (singing hills cycle #1) a lovely novella set in an asian-inspired fantasy empire, which shows young cleric chih and their speaking hoopoe almost brilliant learn the story of a previous empress, a northerner who rose from exile as an cast-aside wife to power and of her servant, a peasant girl called rabbit. enjoyed the setting and the way this story unfolded through objects and rabbit’s retelling, and will definitely read the sequel novella which comes out in december. 3.5/5

pine, francine toon (audio) this is a crime/thriller type book with some horror elements about a young girl whose mother has disappeared mysteriously when she was very small. she lives with her dad in the scottish highlands close to a giant forest. the beginning is pretty cool & creepy, but then like 80% of it is just the girl being sad & wanting to know what happened to her mother & the dad being an alcoholic mess. and then most of the plot happens in the last 10% & isn’t great. disappointing. 2/5

where the wild ladies are, aoko matsuda (tr. from japanese by polly barton) a collection of short stories retelling japanese folklore stories about female ghosts/monsters with a feminist twist. on the whole, i liked these stories, but also found them a lot more light in tone than i expected; i guess i thought this would be more on the wild & raw side, so i ended up finding them a bit underwhelming. might also be a problem with lacking cultural context. will say tho that tilted axis press is great & i will seek out more of their books. 2.5/5

piranesi, susanna clarke (audio) god this was so good! so delightful! the House with its many rooms full of tides and clouds and birds and statues is a wonderful, magical yet melancholy setting, the narrator is kind & gentle & earnest, full of wonder and curiosity at the House and its mysteries (the contrast between the narrator’s and the Other’s attitude to the House... yes), the slow building up to the numerous reveals are just. very well done. the writing is lovely (did i almost cry about the albatross? yes) and chiwetel ejiofor is a great audio narrator. just all around lovely & the ending hits just right. 4.5/5

doomsday book, connie willis reading this book during lockdown #2.... a galaxy brain move i wouldn’t necessarily recommend. anyway this is set in a near future where time travel is used for historical research; oxford university is sending the young historian kivrin on the first mission to the middle ages (1320, which is perfectly safe, as far as medieval years go), but things go wrong and soon modern day oxford is under quarantine (ha. how wild. can you imagine.) and kivrin notices that some things are a bit off about where she is (spoiler it’s actually 1348 and y’all know what that means right... PLAGUE TIME). lots of people on goodreads found this slow and boring and while it is pretty damn slow (and for a world with time travel way too many plot points hinge on being unable to contact people by telephone), i found it riveting and uh dread-inducing throughout, but also really warm and immersive. adored this, was devastated at the end. even almost a month later i’m still in my feelings about it. 4.5/5

too loud a solitude, bohumil hrabal (tr. from czech by michael henry heim) a novella i intellectually appreciated but didn’t really love - the narrator works as a paper compactor in a nightmarish basement full of mice (that also get crushed by the hundreds) from where he imagines rat wars in the sewers but from where he also saves hundreds of books. it’s fascinating & well-written but as soon as it gets away from the nightmare paper-crushing basement, it just loses its appeal, especially when the narrator reminisces about his relationships to women (how to simultaneously put women on a pedestal and smear shit on them!!!). 3/5

i’m thinking of ending things, iain reid literary horror/thriller type book with a really intriguing first half, as a young woman is visiting her boyfriend’s parents for the first time while thinking of ending the relationship and things increasingly feel off (the parents are weird, there’s a picture on the wall that the boyfriend claims is him as a child, but is actually her, she gets weird voicemails from her own number). great sense of vague unease, very scary. then the second half kind of blows up the whole story in a way that i should theoretically find interesting but just found kind of underwhelming and not scary, especially since the ending then feels the need to spell it all out for you. 2/5

passing, nella larsen (reread) ugh this is brilliant and i almost don’t have anything to say about it so i’ll just summarise it i guess. it’s a novella about two black women in 1920s america, who knew each other as teenagers and who run into each other in a rooftop bar, where both of them are passing as white. irene finds out that clare is passing full-time, married to a white man who does not know that she is black, and although she strongly disapproves, she can’t help but be seduced (the queer subtext is strong here) into renewing their friendship, which begins to threaten her sense of stability and control. this book is pretty much pitch-perfect, has a lot of things to say about race, loyalty, what happens when categories we live by are threatened or destabilised, and is also just tight and elegantly written and. ugh. brilliant. 5/5

ring shout, p. djèlí clark an alternative history/fantasy book where the ku klux klan gets possessed by demons from another dimension and a group of black (and other marginalised) women (some men too) who are able to see these demons have to fight them from gaining more power through a showing of birth of a nation. note: the klan is still already evil without the demons, but their evil makes it easier for the demons to possess them. very cool concept, very cool setting, but i found the main character and some of the plot progression a little boring. 3/5

amberlough, lara elena donnelly (amberlough dossier #1) this is really just the nazi takeover of weimar berlin in an alternate world (literally... the denizens of the city of amberlough are amberlinians... the two epigraphs are from le carre and cabaret...), told thru an amberlinian spy (cyril) forced to work for the nazi-equivalent (the ospies), his secret cabaret mc/smuggling kingpin boyfriend (aristide), and rough-and-tumble sally bowles (cordelia). as such, it’s extremely my shit, although i will say that donnelly makes it a bit easy on herself by making the nazi parallel so very overt; the ospies’ ideology is not particularly detailed beyond ‘real fashy’ and wanting to unite four loosely federated states. it’s just.... a bit weaksauce, and while she does include an ethnic minority for the ospies to hate, this also doesn’t feel as fundamental to their ideology as it should. also cyril sucks. but these issues may be solved in the sequels & it was a lot of fun. also.... amazing cover. 3/5

the vanishing half, brit bennett very much in conversation with larsen’s passing, this is a 2020 historical novel about passing, colorism, and identity, in which desiree and stella, very light-skinned african american twins who grow up in a black town that values lightness very much, become separated when stella chooses to pass for white and marry a white man. the book is very immersive and engaging, and stella and desiree are interesting characters, but (i felt unfortunately) much of the book is focused on their daughters, whose chance meeting might expose stella/reunite the sisters/etc etc, but who weren’t as interesting. the plot also relies on coincidences a lot which is a bit annoying. still an interesting and entertaining read. 3/5

die stadt der anderen, anthology printed version of an art project where three pairs of authors were sent on trips through berlin, which each person writing about what the other person showed them and how they experienced the city through the other. there was nothing earth-shaking in this, but reading it during lockdown was lovely. in conclusion i love berlin... would love to experience it again some time. 3/5

the fire this time, edited by jesmyn ward collection of essays on anti-black racism in america, many in response to the beginning of the black lives matter movement. i don’t have much to say about it, but it is very good and i would recommend. as is often the case with essay anthologies about serious topics i don’t really think i can rate it.

intimations, zadie smith a very short collection of essays written during early lockdown. smith is always smart and fun but i wish these had been a little more focused on politics and less on personal experience, but like, you can’t really criticise a book for not being what you wanted it to be. ‘contempt as a virus’ was very good. 

superior: the return of race science, angela saini really solid, engaging and accessible discussion of race science and why... it’s bad & dangerous, both looking at race science in the past and the invention of race, and how it is returning and regaining influence (not to say that race science ever completely disappeared, but as saini explains, it moved into a more marginal space in the sciences after ww2). 3.5/5

the hive, camilo josé cela (tr. from spanish by j.m. cohen & arturo barea) spanish modern classic set in madrid during the last few years of ww2. told thru short fragmentary snippets with a huge rotating cast of characters, mostly lower and middle class, going about their days, with the theme tying them together being “the city, that tomb, that greased pole, that hive”, which is a very sexy line, but unfortunately it didn’t work for me. the tone is v dispassionate and in combination with the huge cast it just made me profoundly unengaged. it also has the weird habit of changing scene in the middle of a paragraph, which i found rather confusing. 2.5/5 slave old man, patrick chamoiseau (tr. from french by linda coverdale) absolutely amazing short novel from the creolité movement aabout an old slave, seemingly resigned to his position, suddenly escaping and being pursued by the slavemaster’s terrifying monstrous mastiff through the forests of martinique, but really also about selfhood, relearning humanity, trauma and nature. the language is at turns sparse and lush and always gorgeous and the translation from french/creole uses endnotes (we love an endnote) and a strategy of doubling to retain some of the original language, which was really cool to read. so yeah this is brilliant. 4/5

mexican gothic, silvia moreno-garcia gothic horror novel about young mexican socialite noemí visiting her recently-married cousin in her new (english) family’s isolated, creepy and dilapidated mansion after said cousin sent a disturbing and strange letter calling for help. gothic horror shenanigans involving vivid dreams, family secrets and eugenics ensue. after a slow start, i absolutely devoured the second half in one afternoon bc once it gets going it REALLY gets going. not super-scary, but a nice creepy atmosphere & reveal. also loved how it combines the clear yellow wallpaper inspo (the cousin’s letter involves people in the wallpaper) and the focus on the english family’s eugenic ideology (not a fun fact but charlotte perkins gilman was a eugenicist), and the vain & flighty but also smart & stubborn protagonist. had a lot of fun with this. 3.5/5

i’m also still reading a tale of love and darkness by amos oz which is really good but which is taking me forfuckingever. 

[charlenelouise-gdc]

Personal Practice:

London Film Festival 2019: Review

2 - 13 October 2019. This is potentially one of my favourite times of the year.

For me, its such an important period in my calendar - not only professionally but personally. I find film festivals a wonderful way of watching or accessing films. There is almost an organic way to it: seeing it with fresh eyes, everyone being in the same boat or seeing it before everyone else, not influenced by other people’s comments or opinions (on the film being screened). It allows me to have a pure experience with the film. I am able to cultivate my own ideas on it and evaluate it later on down the line. It feels much more like a richer experience.

Also, I simply love the buzz that it involves. The conversations had, emotions shared and the people you meet. From the screenings to the red carpet, I feel like there is a good sense of community. I find festivals a wholesome, exciting experience. Also, I feel a lot closer to my aspirations as a filmmaker in this setting. It makes me feel hopeful.

Most importantly, it reminds me why I love the art form in the first place. Being united by one thing before them and seeing the natural reaction among crowds, this is something rare - especially in a world that often feels “lonely" and when there seems to be very little reason to be united about.

Of course, in the time of digital distribution and binge-watching, these new found ways of distribution has its own positives. This is particularly true in reach; on demand viewing makes cinema a much more democratic experience. For instance, they enable niche, independent films to be seen by those who live in remote places or do not have access to independent cinemas without the need of travelling to major cities like London or New York. Both methods of viewing, on demand and via the cinema, are equally important and has their own strengths. At the end of the day, as long as the film is being shown and reaches its audience - that’s all that matters. However, there is still must be said about the cinema experience and the magic it offers. In its darkness and the glow of the projector, you get to escape and enter another world momentarily - live out the ordinary you know of.  Film festivals, to me, is cinema viewing in its purest form and preserves that experience.

I was also lucky to be in the presence of the filmmakers themselves in some of my screenings. In the special presentations and Q+A sessions that followed the screening, they were able to contextualise their films and share the process behind the choices they make. I learned a lot from them and its a good educational experience.

In this year’s programme, I was able to watch the following films… I have also included some initial thoughts and comments from my notes for future reference.

Our Ladies (Dir. Michael Caton-Jones) - Drama/Comedy Heartwarming! Such a good feel-good film. Close to my heart as I come from Catholic education and has female friendship at the heart of it. It shows what good casting can do and proves it’s an equally important creative choice. The main ensemble really carried the film and a great part of what makes it so charming. Can’t wait to watch again!

The Lighthouse (Dir. Robert Eggers) - Horror/Drama Excellent, well-crafted sound design. Quite wild for an 8am viewing. The framing and composition of the image are done with great precision; it’s quite stunning to watch and I couldn’t look away despite feeling sheer terror at times.

Make Up (Dir. Claire Oakley) - Psychological Drama Unfortunately unable to finish the film due to scheduling conflict. Promising story against a holiday park backdrop and brings to light seaside small town life (which is often overlooked). Interesting blend of genre. 

Premature (Dir. Eashaad Ernesto Green) - Drama Most disliked film from my viewing. Although I appreciate the authentic portrayal/visibility of Black youth in what seems to be an alternative of New York city life (away from the glamourised, white lens), the story is so underwhelming. Too tragic at times and pacing was dull. Lots of unnecessary shots (especially during intimate scenes) that served no purpose aside from catering to the male gaze - a complete disservice to the strong female lead its meant to be portray.

House of Us (Dir. Yoon Ga-eun) - Drama/Family A tender story. Told from children’s point of view which is so refreshing to watch; it served as a nice reminder that children are whole people too, with their own thoughts and valid feelings - which I often forget. As a society, we often disregard them for being dependent or “incomplete”. Although I found myself being annoyed at the children, the film really makes you empathetic. Colour grading is divine; has a childlike brightness that honours the story and the lens its being told. Followed similar style to “Florida Project”, where a lot of the image is shot a low height to resemble children’s perspective.

Marriage Story (Dir. Noah Baumbach) - Drama/Comedy-Drama Good performances from Johansson and Driver. I particularly loved the opening as it symbolised the beginning of the end for the couple. It had a wonderful attention to detail too (the letters). Baumbach is a good screenwriter and hits the lines where its suppose to be (e.g. fight at the apartment near the end of the film, although Charlie says such childish things - its reflective of the truth/a natural reaction to such event).

The Kingmaker (Dir. Lauren Greenfield) - Documentary/Drama About Philippine politics. Made me feel so angry as it hits so close to home, which still affect me and my family today. Clever structure. It begins by almost mocking Imelda Marcos which gives it  a comedic effect and a lighthearted touch - necessary to tackling a heavy subject. However, it unravels slowly and leaves you with a gut punch feeling in the end, hitting you cold hard facts and what reality is for the ordinary Filipino people - away from Imelda’s rich and flamboyant world. It made me want to start a revolution.

The Disappearance of My Mother (Dir. Beniamino Barrese) - Documentary A story told in a such loving lens. An interesting study on the relationship (of Benedetta Barzini) with the camera - especially as a model and now through her filmmaker son’s lens. Raises the questions: how to be seen, how would you like to be seen, to what level or depth you can actually be seen. Nice mix of archive and interviews. I like the imperfect shots the most where the filmmaker just carries the camera - shaky, unbalanced; it makes it feel more intimate.

And Then We Danced (Dir. Levan Akin) - Romance/Drama Warm and tender. Beautiful colour grading that matched the essence of the film - delightful yellow tones. Such an important story to tell and captured the zeitgeist of today (lgbt love story/coming of age in one of the most orthodox countries in the world - Georgia). Respectful portrayal of Georgian dance and traditions; shown with honour and pride. Closing scene is so moving and strong; it captures him coming to terms with his identity - both as a dancer and as a queer person. The desire told in this story is multifaceted - his desire to become the best dancer and his desire for Irakli.

Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Dir. Céline Sciamma) - Romance/Drama A compelling story. I’m always fascinated by strong stories that is held together by a small ensemble or little cast. It reminds me that as long as you have a solid story and characters with depth, you don’t need a lot to make it a fulfilling and rememberable. Bursting with colour. Every frame feels like a painting. The cinematography has a beautiful kind of stillness; I appreciate this so much as it feels like a complete antithesis to society/our current way of life. So refreshing to see the female gaze in its full glory. Closing scene is so moving and powerful - similar to Luca Guadagnino’s Call Me By Your Name. This really stayed with me.

Overseas Documentary (Dir. Yoon Sung-A) - Documentary Interesting background - Belgian/French production about a Filipino story, told by a Korean director. I really enjoyed the observational eye this documentary is told; allowing the story unfold by itself. It enabled the people to tell their story; the most authentic and truthful lens.

Lingua Franca (Dir. Isabel Sandoval) - Drama Promising work from Sandoval. Another important story worth telling, especially since its a minority story (trans, undocumented woman in America, trying to get a Green Card/be legalised; how this is a dehumanising process). However, I find that it focused too much on tragedy. Also, editing felt off at times or left too ambiguous.

Matthias + Maxime (Dir. Xavier Dolan) - Drama A pretty loud film. Lots of talking. Production Design is kind of weird as it doesn’t put a timestamp on the story (not sure if it was the 80s or early 2000s?). Perhaps this is to make the story timeless? But a part of me just found it a bit confusing. Strong casting and the ensemble is captivating to watch. I liked how the root of what happened to Matthias and Maxime wasn’t shown to show how it affected them after and the kiss wasn’t sensationalised. It made their kiss later on much more impactful (in relation to the build up). Nice story but not Dolan’s best.

Dogs Don’t Wear Pants (Dir. Jp. Valkeapää) - Drama Interesting experience. Offered a much more in-depth perspective on BDSM, on a personal/humanising standpoint that is beyond pleasure. Production Design was excellent. Cinematography is so precise and there’s a clear visual language shown. Hard story to get into and the pacing is quite slow, with a sudden rush near the end of the story.

Rocks (Dir. Sarah Gavron) - Drama/Youth Beautiful cast and has girls from minority backgrounds at the heart of its story - something that British cinema is yet to improve on. Interesting that the ensemble is made up of mainly non-actors to keep the youthful spirit alive. Making process is certainly interesting. However, the story is pretty much a given and I find that it focused too much on tragedy.

A Hidden Life (Dir. Terrance Malick) - War/Drama Slow cinema; nice contrast to the world and pace of life we all lead. Stunning cinema throughout: crisp sound design and cinematography feels like a painting, honouring nature and the environment. Really keep the senses alive. I like the use of the “active camera” (tracking shots, handheld), during the points of the film where it was the most joyful - it truly captured the beauty of life. Lots of upward shots, featuring the sky - something quite holy and feels omnipresent. I like how the bond between the husband and wife is portrayed by the letters, which carries the story forward - a nice technique.

Personal favourites:

Tier 1: Our Ladies, And Then We Danced, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, The Kingmaker Tier 2: Matthias + Maxime, Lingua Franca, The Lighthouse

_______________________________

Additional viewings: Short Film - Programme 1 and 2 Programme 1: If I Knew / What do you know about the water and moon / White Girl / Fault Line / Gu04 / In Vitro Programme 2:

Algorithm / Between / In Between / Child / Watermelon Juice / Queering in Teknolojik

Seeing the Short Film Programme is also important in my professional development as its much more closer to where I am at in my practice. It showed me the kind of stories that are currently being told by my contemporaries and opens me up to new techniques or alternative ways of storytelling. Its always a eye opening experience and pushes me out of my comfort zone, widening my knowledge. It raises the questions: how can I do things differently? What makes this technique or story particularly strong? What do I like about this? What do I dislike about this? What are the key elements which makes me drawn to it. These questions and observations will help me shape and refine my practice. I hope to apply these in my next film and I look forward to what is next.

_______________________________

In the following year, I look forward to attending Cannes Film Festival (May) and Sundance London (May/June). Film festivals continue to have a special place in my heart.

[possibilistfanfiction]

you know the good die young (hopeless changes over time)

[i was asked for a continuation of hospital au w carm & lexa as best friends in it so here u go sry its short i will have lots more prompts up in the next few days!]

//

you know the good die young (hopeless changes over time)

//

‘who are you texting?’ lexa asks, leaning over a little to try to peek at your phone.

‘none of your fucking business,’ you say, locking your phone and then glaring at her as best you can.

lexa smirks. ‘you were smiling.’

‘shut your mouth, woods.’

her smirk turns into a full blown grin. ‘you were!’

‘whatever,’ you say, but it’s not with too much bite, partially because lexa is very pathetically pretending to do the hip exercises her physio gave her but also because she’s kind of wheezing and lugging around an oxygen tank is never fun. also your head hurt so bad this morning you didn’t even want to wear a beanie, which.

sucks.

lexa sighs and you know she’s only done four reps instead of ten but you haven’t done any so you let that go.

‘tell me about them,’ she insists, lying back and then looking at you. like, imploringly, with these big pale eyes and you kind of hate her, she’s gotten so fucking pretty.

‘i met her in the ER.’

‘of course you did,’ lexa says. ‘typical.’

‘you met clarke through some asshat with stage II aml.’

‘you like octavia.’

‘child’s play, truly.’

lexa laughs. you’ve known her since you were both very young, in and out of the hospital at various overlapping times. you were diagnosed with a medulloblastoma when you were two, and it keeps coming back, and you’ve also had mets removed from your liver three times, and it’s kind of just really fucking annoying at this point. you just got into every university you applied to, but that was apathetic and mostly at the urging of your parents, who try to be very positive. it’s terrible and mostly you and lexa are friends because she needs a heart transplant and two days ago surgeons injected polio into your tumor—your brain—because it’s not responding to chemo or radiation anymore so.

whatever.

‘tell me about her,’ lexa says, and she coughs into the crook of her elbow again and when she tries to take a breath you can hear the fluid in her lungs. you know she’s on the top of the UNOS list but neither of you are that naive.

you decide to humor her because she’s done the same for you more times than you can count. when you were twelve and she was eleven, you were both in the hospital for months, and she’d always sneak you food from the cafeteria when you were on a strict diet, and she’d help you with math if you helped her with english. when your tumor didn’t respond quickly to radiation, you lost your vision for a few days, which was terrifying, but lexa would talk quietly and tell you all kinds of little stories she made up, read to you and make you laugh, fall asleep in the same bed. you were friends with costia, too, who was maybe the nicest, coolest person you’ve ever known, and it was fun to watch lexa stumble around and blush. she was the first person you ever came out to, and she just smiled and said, ‘me too, i think,’ and. well. she’s your best friend.

‘her name is elle and she’s like. not sick at all? she cut her finger on a bagel knife.’

lexa wheezes another laugh. ‘just your luck.’

‘she’s so pretty,’ you say, breathily and you’re kind of embarrassed but you walked in on clarke and lexa kissing yesterday so you don’t really care. you go to her instagram and then reluctantly hand your phone to lexa, who scrolls for a few seconds before nodding.

‘she’s beautiful, carm.’

‘yeah.’

‘don’t know what in the world drew her to you.’

you laugh, because lexa was smiling halfway through that half-hearted insult. ‘fuck you.’

‘you’d love that, wouldn’t you?’

‘you’re an asshole.’

‘i’m living on borrowed time. creates a sophisticated sense of humor.’

you roll your eyes and take back your phone. your head is still pounding and your physio is caught up trying to help a toddler losing his shit, and when you gesture to the door lexa shrugs and then nods.

you help her with her oxygen tank and when you get dizzy for a second she holds out her arm, which is only funny because if either of you fell the other would be fucked, but you chance one last glance at your physio before making a break for it.

when lexa makes a beeline for the elevator you know she’s headed to the roof, which is your favorite. somehow she stole an access pass from your least favorite surgeon and you’ve been using it ever since. you quietly ride to the top, make sure there are no waiting ER personnel and then sit on a bench near the edge. you go to get out a belmont when lexa glares.

‘i have an oxygen tank, you idiot.’

‘go out in a blaze of glory. hot.’

‘you’re so dumb,’ she says, but she looks out over the city with a smile anyway. you’re both quiet for a while, but then lexa sighs. ‘it was easier when we didn’t care about dying, wasn’t it?’

‘young love is awful,’ you say, your chest aching when you look at your best friend’s profile, backlit by the rich pressed velvet sky and lights in contrast.

‘i really want a heart,’ she says, quietly and like she’s never admitted it that concretely before.

‘you’ll get one,’ you say, and you feel sure despite having no real reason to. these things fail all the time but you can’t imagine the world without lexa in it.

‘how does your brain feel?’

‘it would be better without that kid fucking screaming for thirty minutes earlier.’

she laughs, but just once. ‘you know what i mean.’

you shrug. ‘i feel like i’ve had a migraine for days but like. i can see and hear and all that which dr peko says is a good sign. i have a pet scan tomorrow.’

‘okay,’ lexa says, solid and sure and soft like she always has been. you don’t talk for a while but when you check your phone you have a picture from elle, of her dog, and you can’t help but show it to lexa, who literally like gasps. you laugh and tell her to back up just a little, take a picture of her backlit, smiling with the skyline. you don’t send it to elle, after you look at it, because it’s just for you. you take a picture of a cigarette instead, in front of some of the biggest buildings you can see.

i cannot believe you smoke, elle texts back.

just like any normal queer punk kid

lexa grins—you can tell, even in the dark, that little fucker.

‘fuck off,’ you tell her, shoving her lightly. she shrugs and you debate playing never have i ever because you really want to ask if lexa finally had sex, but then the door opens and dr. martinez bustles out.

‘carmilla,’ she says, and you roll your eyes at lexa, who grins. you like dr. martinez a lot, but you just really fucking hate being stabbed, which you know is what she’s finding you for.

‘sup,’ you say, get to your feet slowly and then help lexa to hers.

‘you know you’re not supposed to be out here,’ she says, and you shrug while lexa fiddles with her oxygen.

‘we’re dying children, dr. martinez.’

‘you are not dying. not on my watch,’ she says, ushering you back into the building. you ride back down with her and she makes sure to see lexa collected by a nurse in the cardio wing before leading you away.

bye lexa texts you, followed by alternating sobbing/smirking emojis

you're so weird

bye tho see u tomorrow

sneak out for cafeteria breakfast? she asks.

yah sure. u buy tho

deal

cool,  you send, then you know this means u can’t die tonight

lexa sends a gif of rihanna trying to wink, which makes you laugh, and then i won’t. promise

ok, you text. love u pal

you know she’s smiling, because lexa is soft like that.

love you too, carm

you get some decent pain meds before you go to sleep, and you only get woken up once that night, and maybe things are working, because the next morning your head hurts less, and you make it, no problem, to see your friend waiting for you, smiling, a table already saved.

[cto10121]

The Riddle of Man

Fandom: Harry Potter Genre: Poetry Sites: ao3, ff.net Ships: Tom/OC, Tom/Bellatrix, Harry/Ginny Summary: An orphaned boy rises to become the most powerful and feared wizard of his age. But when he hears a prophecy about a boy destined to defeat him, his own deadly action spells his undoing. Or should we say, his inaction? The true story of the man who became Lord Voldemort. AU. OOC for good reason. 

A/N: This is the impostume of reading too much Shakespeare, which outward breaks and knows not why potential readership dies. But for those who don’t mind this weird marriage of poetry and fanfic, here it is. For anyone unused to verse, try reading aloud, softly, to yourself. It will make better sense that way.

The Riddle of Man

Though oft the sweet-sung tale of late renown Among our common laud, a troubled mind Did lead me once to quiet witness sound, Whose tale obscure too late did wisdom find, Ere he was laid on fruitless ground to rest: So this, in’s memory, I’ll tell to test. 

There lived a boy of raven hue, whose eyes All eyes did draw to praise, like midnight sheer On iv’ry marble smooth, that, realized, Did show to all his beauty’s moonlight clear. And groped to him describe in just compare, As dark Adonis of renownèd fair.   

His charms did charm, his pleasing wit bewitched, Enchanting craft which swiftly won the grace Of wondered wizard and of swooning witch, Which easy skill had shown the telling trace Of ancient Slytherin, his mother’s line, That all gave due to noble blood’s divine. 

His talent known, at school he rose to fame, For in all of curse and jinx and hex excelled, And there grew known his stranger’s Muggle name, Though in his vein coursed blood of Peverell. And soon him followed in a loving throng A motley court that sued for favor longed. 

A love had he, one Coralina Smith, Niece to old Hepzibah, Hufflepuff’s heir. Though Slytherin-sorted, of cunning pith, Her heart was golden gentleness’ fair. Her grace he wooed, courted, and present won, And with her went after schooling done. 

But lo, it cannot be that matchless form Can spotless match within; for violent birth Of need-imbibed desire, like the worm, Does seethe and chafe to prove its scanted worth In ancient world of magic’s right and might, Where strong seize all, and weakling fall from sight. 

So young Tom Riddle (hight) like fury strove At Borgin’s worked till morning’s shadow eye, His lover like a wife, balm to his behove, His confidante in every act and lie. This love like coin resembled, on each side, Where mirror twins of blackest fair resides.

“Master Burke for your advancement speaks,” Said she in whispered confidence of bed, “A vacancy, which falls on thee to seek! Lest some popinjay take it in thy stead; For even lowly Ministry hire May rise to fill his dark desire.” 

So up, our Tom preferred, like blooming rose, Or special magnet which success draws near, Or moon the ocean’s tide attracts it close, Did climb to ranks of rank ambition’s dear, Which seeks the earthly fruit of polis crown That grants immortal heights from humble ground. 

A politic career had made him well, And soon a loyal twelve, who called him lord, Of talent profit and in leisure dwell, With selfsame hungry want for power’s hoard. And in this pledge did swear to serve ‘a true At his command by wand of phoenix yew. 

What then, in spring success, could augur bring? His lover now his wife, his lordship’s queen; The Phoenix order fled on frighted wing, The Ministry at heel, his power seen; Why, then, this leaden flash, this dew of cold, That harrows up the bone to press him old? 

“A prophecy, my lord.” Thus plague begun. His man Severus, bone-white, spoke in few: “Your death’s proclaimed by newborn summer son, Whom you must end, or risk your state undo. This Sibyl Trelawney with rasping speech Spoke fearful fortune; hear it, I beseech. 

“The sons of these two enemies, both alike In dignity and danger they present: Fair Longbottom, and Potter in his spite, Which your success they bitter most resent: As families of ancient line and clout, Your hard-won right they scorn, your blood they doubt. 

“O, good my lord, do not this augur heed, The vague pronouncement of uncertain word, To mark each penny-filching doctor’s greed And loose your judgment to reason most absurd. For augurs are like rakehell oaths, all bawds, And this Trelawney shy of certain fraud. 

“O, yet while you’ve your strength, take care defend The triumph of your state through power’s just! For sudden acts precipitate their end, Like lover’s frenzy dead in passion’s dust. What need, therefore, to spur from glory’s sun, And plan a fell attack on Lily’s son? 

“Darling Lily’s son, and Longbottom’s too, Are nothing to your lordship’s grace compared; Say they’ll grow to do you wrong, say that’s true: ��Tis common known that common ends by rare. Your patience stay; but if you needs must act, On Longbottom fall your preventive tact. 

“Your mercy, lord, commends your mercy’s grace, In granting me your humble servant’s plea, To spare that love that love itself did lace With beauty’s rose and fortune’s starry lea. Then in your wisest censure judge Whether greater lord would lesser plea begrudge.” 

“I do conceive,” (this in reply), “thy plight, Severus; so I here confess me free From fond gain-giving or too-credent fright In piercing shallow mists of prophecy. For when I give consent to fear invest Pronounce me bankrupt in both wit and rest.” 

And yet it’s often seen that jealousy, When faced with Fortune’s accidents, Runs sweaty mind with sharp conspiracy, And nurtures compost seeds of false intent. So ‘twas the seeress proved her risky lie, When both that month his motion’s plans defied. 

To Dumbledore the fam’lies swore an oath, And joined his Phoenix order to prevent The fearful promise of his office troth: By courting the pureblood constituent, Prestige and power gain, in nation rule, And nevermore play fortune’s motley fool. 

But dark and queer, the dreams that haunt the life, Like swinging pendulum of nightmare trance! So deep his brood it did alarm his wife, Who stayed the loose-held reigns of augured chance To tell him this: “This seeress is but light; Stay, therefore, do not order judgment’s flight. 

“’Tis always been the truc of prophecy, Itself to realize its self’s belief With vague announcement garbed as certainty, Of which, for proof, their own self proof is chief. Thus builds a hollow case in iron proof, Like lawyer’s edifice’s absent roof. 

“To do this deed, your credit would undo, Which yet some eye of public favor holds, For trophies, trinkets, offices that honor you Their luster lost, their waste is present sold. Advancement by this act so would fly Your fortune forfeit, that hour’s honor dies. 

“I say this not to stay, oh, understand, Thy mounting name; but thou must yet fear With too-small pause to dye thy spotless hand, And easy fall in murder’s blackened smear. Oh, do not thee so: For all greatness must The jealous mass attract like scented lust. 

“This Sibyl is a punk, a drab, a pass, Who never spoke in life a word of truth: Cassandra’s blood, though not her See she has, And so she’s worked as pandlar-bawd since youth. To credit her a minute past her rate, Would soon reduce ye to a beggar’s state.”

“This advice of caution’s well” (so spoke he) “And therefore caution will I best employ: To crush the bud before it flowers me With pestilence, else spell my end in joy. For sickness left untendered deathly rage To leave one simple mark upon a page.” 

“Wilt thou aid me, Cora? Dost thou approve?” They clinging fast, a little world in room, And, silent, understood the force which moves The trembling thread through steady weaving loom, And weave the silky purse with icy will Which glory’s expectation helps keep still.

II.

The night of Hallows’ Eve drew velvet black. The moon, forewarned, had cloaked herself from see; In laden streets a masquerade was wracked Like glimm’ring jewels in solemn ebony.   But lo, how starless was this hallowed night, As if these loyal guards had quit in fright! 

And if some common portents there were seen, As owl’s daylight pass or talking horse; The dire thunderclap, the lone wolf’s keen, A ghost relating horror in blank verse, None bore the fruit of witness or of deed; But horror more than these did proceed. 

And, ghosting, cloaked through village festive’s streets, The riddle walked with slow, ungainly tread. A flask through gripless fingers, flavored sweet, Empty rang the streets as slipping courage fled. Each step proclaimed: Let fall life, usher death, For only fools dare barter precious breath. 

A child, no more, a life to say but one, Untested thought that grows in’s promise doubt. Then kind enough t’eclipse this flaming son, Lest fiery growth in danger scorch him out. What lacks he, then, but strength of chosen will, To banish evil life with goodly kill? 

Fair or dark, dark and fair, or darkly fair, To ravel future fall from stars divine; Which peril’s boy discern, which wizard’s heir Would one day claim, “This life were mine”? And then unbidden came the knowing spark – Fair and dark had fought; so won the dark. 

The hallowed Hollow in evening’s Hallow, Rose rosy vision of a mountain mist. Whiskey quickened blood and breathing shallow, The web of fogging doubt that must desist. Till in his memory’s abstract lived this creed: To never stay till ending of this deed. 

So banish doubt, sink feeling to the bone; And flaming mind abate with cooling patience. Make lily-livered heart to practice stone, Leave mother mercy off with temperance. And should in this endeavor triumph can, You’d prove yourself a more than mortal man. 

Within was dark without a sound. A chance Of pause him stayed: Was this a trap, a trick? Had the Potters warning of his advance? A furious stream of light replied, a lick Of smarting curse – the jealous father stood, Armed and ready to defend his brood. 

No discourse, all instinct, marked the first exchange, And silent house her secret soon disclosed. They fought as teething beasts, deranged, Where one opponent fell, the other rose. Till both in struggle had about the neck; A moment’s beat before the fatal wreck. 

The flash of jade this shattered mirror caught, The slash that chasm tore the living place – What eye would horror glimpse, received unsought, The cleanly break’s irrevocable case? The body fell, and so fell too marred youth, That bit of soul that so betrayed its truth. 

In silence rang, though never heard, the moan Whose mournful treble for her husband’s death Would have stole the general ear and sown In ev’ry sleeping conscience anguished breadth, And make the stones themselves on murder cry Which joined his racing blood where conscience lies. 

The lick of flame that vanished on the stair At his trespass and sequent wizard’s duel Now flashed in desp’rate quickness ‘round the fair It gilded, like porcelain of queenly rule, Now fleshly pale at horror’s hasty side Her tender hidden from the wicked hide. 

“Desist, depart,” she cried. “No more, I pray – Take me instead; I do throw my life of care, And your hand upon my head fear not stay. But not my boy, no, not my son, him spare, And I will do you any service, now, So changing mercy with a servant’s vow.” 

“I have no quarrel nor no use for thee,” Quoth he. “Stand aside. Mercy will I give If thou my business let unhindered free, ‘Less like thy husband thou wilt scorn to live. So quit thy begging – no, I cannot hear – Leave hanging from my sleeve, come not so near.” 

“Kind master, good lord,” she sobbed. “Don’t refuse; You cannot be so kindless, no, you must, Nor can you my frankness so abuse And kill for naught the simplest sense of just. Have pity, then, upon my state, have soul, Which you know I know you have, that yet is whole. 

“Or better still, take him alive; how great Your triumph then, to turn a dreaded foe To friend, to son, to chief of highest state; How can he turn, raised to love you so? For all the best do know for war to end You must a present foe turn future friend. 

“Oh, raise him, then, be father and mother To him, and use me as pleases your will: As your servant, woman, both, or other, At table, bed, or secretary’s quill, At hand to do whatever needs be done, So long as he may live your honored son.” 

“What mother mothered, what father fathered! When I was this boy’s age, a stranger filled My cup of need along with several others Orphaned by indifferent fortune, whose will Decreed the curse of life of endless want!” This spoke with maddened eye and favor gaunt. 

“Be grateful, then, thy son will never know The orphan plight of raising tear-flesh shame, That must surrender constant proof, or grow In banished self the cancer of his name. Such little lives in fettered darkness lead, That souls that leave are blinkered by their need. 

“Forbear! Thou silly wench, think’st thou me kind? This kindness lost, if ever had, is bar To acts of heightened pitch which will find A greater glory reaching farther star. Then come what fate and sorrow follow: Beyond them lies the hope of better morrow.” 

So shoved she aside, but no sooner done Than she with stinging hex attempted wide, Which, blocked, ended what had scarce begun: Avada Kedavra answered her pride. And struck her to the core of living life The light extinct with cut of fiery knife. 

And this exchange the child witnessed all, Unknowing eyes that nursed the wounded gash And humor mild at his mother’s fall, Consumed by eerie glow of em’rald lash, Which stole his loyal mother from his right Into the plunge of everlasting night.

The murderer, the infant in its crib, For a moment’s beat formed a painted scene, As if the sortilege of fate had dimmed And froze the famous pair in Avada-green. A frescoed Tom and Hal in rival’s sort: The Boy-Who-Lived with so-called Voldemort.

But as we know from ancient faded writ, That time-worn tales do lose their little truth, Traditions turning legend, legend myth, Till age gives faded fancy fancy’s youth, So too this tyrant-beast, so hight, did stay Like statue frozen: Nothing neither way. 

Nothing! Yes, nothing. Wracked in wonder, I Made question, disbelieved this calm report. But him I sounded, with a saddened eye, Knew I knew him true on Voldemort. He stayed his fell, and hidden world did see This Voldemort turn present Voldevie. 

Unseeing stared at the unheeding boy; The moments rolled and lengthened to a crawl. The child, smiling, proffered him his toy,  A furry griffin wrapped in crimson shawl. As if in friendly peace and gesture just, To stranger, if his liking tended thus. 

Decline your wand of yew; it’s over now. Do not with vainest show a falsehood keep. In war a soldier fights to hold his vow, But ever after never finds his sleep. For who would, kindless, innocence slaughter In guise of potential son or daughter? 

He thought on Cora, on himself, his state, The sibyl’s oracle, Snape’s petition. But as he anguished, there heard Apparate The Phoenix, which surrounded the partition. Which forced him to employ his plan’s escape, With friends to hide, join Cora, send for Snape. 

Round, like a circle in a spiraled wheel, The space constricted in an eyelash wink, Through coaxing whirl its spinning thread unreels His liquid essence pooling in a sink, Until the hearth of Riddle House appeared At Cora’s feet, demanding him her fear. 

“I heard rumors from the Hollow,” she said, Pale as ash. “Thou quakest with fear, thy favor’s wild. What happened? Are thou hurt, are they dead? The Phoenix is called; didst thou kill the child?” “No,” he groaned. “No, no. Cora, I am through. I’ve murdered sleep, and sleeping killed I you.” 

“What speech is this? My lord, you shake. Do bend Your discourse into some frame; what occurred? The night’s bleak horrors could no spell forfend; The elves did tremble at each trifle heard. Is the mission undone? Yet tell me so, So flee this place, to further safety go.” 

“Ay, ay, to flee,” he breathed. “We must, ‘tis true. But let us not, sweet wife, ourselves deceive. Forbear all counsel. Here’s my wand of yew: Perform Priori, then break it. Conceive, And let us haste, and there embrace our doom: A burdened life, which must in us assume.” 

Gone was the triumph that had come before, Gone were the fruits of warlike state enjoyed, Gone were safety, peace, the sanctum’s core, The undefiled piece of man and boy. Hope forsaken, vows forsworn, lives undone, They to shadows turned from midnight sun. 

III.

Alone, forsook, in tower languishing, Beneath a sky that held no hint of peace. What little hope that keeps from perishing In’s shrunken breast the fine of shortened lease, Did pace in fev’rish-ill round restless cage, While cold-eyed stars played witness to his rage. 

His orders foiled, his men in blind retreat; His Cora gone, and Severus long since fled; The Hogwarts siege a failure uncomplete, And on each side the living reckoned dead. Now warlike Harry, in his eager pride Flies to Riddle House with heated stride. 

Or so spake rumor; he no longer knew The diff’rence ‘tween a moonlit night and noon, Between autumnal’s chill and springtime dew, Between a loyal man and sycophant’s croon, But dealt each toy with jealous sputt’ring rant, Spurned good and ill alike in scornful cant. 

“What, Yaxley! Malfoy! Rosier! Are all fled? A pox ‘a fops and gulls that cannot stand! Fie, Bella, dost thou hear? Thy husband’s dead, And would his fellows proved so true a man! Go to and hang, ye lily-livered knaves! Is this to pay the graciousness I gave? 

“What, Nott defaulted too? Then traitors, hence! O shamed deceit, these yellow whoreson curs, That feel sans feeling, lose their common sense!” He beat his chest; his lover too did hers, And brought his person level to her eyes, Who comfort gave to ease his great despise.

“Have cheer, my good lord, all is not lost yet; The beasts are fresh, the battle scarce begun; But give me leave to seek out Marsenet – Prithee, lord, give me leave to seek our son, Whom honor pricks in mortal vengeful plan, Seeking young Potter’s death at thy command.” 

“Bella, do not stir from hence! Thee I told A thousand times remain, and so thou wilt; Let Marse his importunity strike bold; Fiori has too much his mother’s milk. For loving Cora’s favor lives in him, And tortures me with madness as its whim.” 

“Proud I am,” said she, fierce, “of Mars’ might, For son so mewed I’d scorn to breathe the name. My honor’s better served to join the fight, And change each Phoenix blow with fatal same. Then let my duty better show in this, Fair warrior die than live in coward’s bliss.” 

“Oh, coward’s bliss,” he sighed. “Would it were mine, And inner calm restore the balm of sleep! Revive the luscious spring of barren time, That left me drowned in crimson ageless deep, Until our self like factious jealous state Undoes itself in chaos rebel’s fate.” 

“Do not so speak,” she hissed. “Oh, fie, oh, fie! Are you a man? Is this proper bearing? Oh, once you could the wrathful gods defy, And now like timid beast thy hairs rise staring! Oh, good my lord, renounce this woman’s chatter; Thy power yet is more than mortal matter.” 

“Leave me, Bel. By Salazar, forbear! Go, then, with Marsenet, take up the cause, And seek Fiori’s stay. Content thee, fair: My years, a tangled scarf of torn-up gauze, Is skinlike stretched to ephemeral taut And seeks a knitted rest from weary lot.” 

But desperate thought, as Bella left, crept in, And colored gaping absence’ memory With too-fine fears that, heartened, slither in, The tempest clouding up his wat’ry see, Till bare and stony tower mirror turned To mock his face, his folly dearly earned. 

For oh, how vile the flesh in loathing steeps, Like poison-vat that thinking gives a cure! Dry lesions in his bony hands, which creeped And tried to tear proud body’s insecure! His beauty’s gone, a shadow coarse’d by years, And manly form weathered by kindly tears. 

Without the distracted lord’s chamber door, In base of winding stair a foot did rest. Gazing up the helix (oh, true Gryffindor!) Was Harry Potter, crown of Hogwarts’ best, Whose Godric’s sword did grip with master right, In churning lust for coming master fight. 

Blood did gild that form unmatched in breadth, That broad poitrine of sleek and wiry strength, Glistening with the salt of valiant breath, That amorous wet each sinew of his length. The dark-fair rose of youth, this golden boy; A wizard prince, Dumbledore’s pride and joy.

“Fiori,” he said, low, “You’re sure he’s there?” “Ay, sweet Harry,” the latter, grim, replied,  “With his own fears made drunk and mad with care, A beast who wallows in the filth he lies; To put him down would be a mercy’s act, And you yourself the sealer of that pact.” 

“Join hands with me, Fiori,” (so said he) “And pardon it, with all thy heart, that fell That ended thy brother’s life. Let, for thee, This cancel crime, foul words between us quell. And let grow fruit of golden amity Thy service honor banished enmity.” 

“Merlin be with thee!” Clasping him, ‘a cried, “Marse’s death fall not on thee. O thou great, O thou most good! An thou wert now to die, What feeling loss would pang the tott’ring state!” “Do not yet speak of death,” said Harry, bleak. “I hate the word, and do defy its weak. 

“Tell Ron of Fenrir, of poor Hagrid’s plight; Break gently news of Fred and George’s fall; Hunt Dolohov, for Remus’ death requite; Send brave Hermione to McGonagall. Bid them join the rest, not to stay for me; Riddle I must face alone, or ne’er be. 

“And one last thing –” He swallowed thickly here. “If by any chance thou see’st Ginny –” But love, which speaks through storm and silenced fear, Through god-ruled fate and mortal tyranny, Did tie his ready tongue with struggling pause: Love too great for words makes speechless cause. 

His friend regardless understood. “Ay, I shall. Never thee fear.” He gazed at him, And laden chest exhumed a pregnant sigh, As if regretting some old childhood whim. And sans another word the two did part, In silent gesture speaking heavy heart. 

The long and slow ascent, the torches’ shade, That led with clammy step to Riddle Tow’r, Took warlike Harry to each passing grade, His noble heart grow fierce with trembling pow’r. For dark his heated purpose, ice his breath, To pay the lord at last his parents’ death. 

He met the door; Alohomora made It yield. The dreaded sight appeared, appalled, The shrunken shadow’s shadow, merest shade. That stood near window with a darkened pall, And did not turn to greet him at the door; So went ignored the noble Gryffindor. 

Neither did silence break with needless speech, Nor flourished wand or blood-caked sword withdrew, Nor cleaved the other’s ear with verbal breach, Or faults with ringing condemnation spewed, Nor even gave with name avenger’s cry, As, “You killed my father. Prepare to die.” 

Instead he turned, and, startled, met his twin, As if in glass or master painter caught, No change without reflecting change within – Tom Riddle had appeared, unwilled, unsought! How could this be? But no, his eye had erred: His mind had hasty jumped to dream preferred. 

No, Harry was himself, his father’s spit, In form and bearing a dark and well-made youth; But in the fire of his almond pit, The emerald Lily lived to blaze her truth: And once again gazed in her killer’s eye, And once again his person she defied. 

“Is’t you at last?” he murmured low. “My foe, Or savior – I’ve long forgot the which. Have you then come to pitch my overthrow, My friends supplant, undo, restrain, bewitch? Or like a sheep in wolfish garb dost come To reckon up my debt to force a sum?” 

“Thy reckoner’s here,” said Harry coldly. “Stand, if you be man, and we our strength shall try. My parents’ loss my glory’s gain shall be, And prove those ancient words which prophesied The fate which knits us in her threaded gyves: ‘Neither can live while the other survives.’” 

“Thou wretched boy!” Rounding in a flashing break. “I’ll see thee ere I go with thy parents sent! Life’s a candle flame that, with slightest quake, The smallest breath may careless usher rent; So stint, thou seed. Take heed to tender light That youthful wick which soon is swallowed night.” 

“Thou thing! Thou paper-king of rags and patch, Thou serpent-prince of foul and ancient rot! The germ of evil and of fell dispatch, That knits disasters in its wedded knot! And now, thou shadow’s shadow, here must end The canker ill of ill’s allowed propend!” 

And not a word thereafter spoken, no, Nor slightest breath of air exchanged; When words do fail, the greater is the show, That follows fast with furious martial range; And so they to’t, wand to wand, man to man, To guard till final breath their person’s stand. 

The grim-eyed chamber lit with charging spell, Some dying splattered on unyielding stone, Exploding firecrackers that did quell On dusty ground extinct by ashy loam. Or else that mortal lash of hex that missed And brushed their robèd arms like streaking kiss. 

Which side more desp’rate and which more maddened, To deal the final blow? Their worth Were equal on both, and Fortune, saddened, Knew well the justice of their troubled birth. And quit her post, leaving weaving wheel, For mortals to decide their own fate’s seal. 

And oh, who did not hear the scream of Bellatrix, But heated blood did freeze in fearful vein? When she her Marse’s death found out the trick That stole his life and she her honor stained, Then sobbing tore through house with vengeful aim; Till stayed by Molly Weasley, grieving same. 

“Thou scorpion, thou scullion poison-well, Thou dram – no, don’t thee dare not walk away! My darling twins thy stainèd hand had felled And now thy debt is mine to make thee pay. Oh, I’ll assure my strike won’t be in vain, For thou wilt harm my children ne’er again.”

“Traitors! Murd’rous knaves and thieves! The fount of foulest, villainous evil! Oh sweet my brave, my darling son!” So grieved, Like tempest gales the heart’s upheaval, It stopped her speech; and blindly struck her wild, In vengeance ‘gainst the world for darling child. 

A clash of opposites, of vicious reach, Twin whirlwind furies of a crimson pitch. Each mother’s grief a circle feeding each, Which called one weasel whore, the other bitch; And fought till Molly caught her on the ground; Her wand like knife to neck did put her down. 

Did he feel, I wonder, his lieutenant,   Before her mortal strings of life were caught? Hope her house had quit, and left as tenant The want that craves its end in naught. And silent begs the mercy-giver act To kill the sullied flesh of shameful fact. 

As Bella went, her lover was disarmed, And slipping, with arm outstretched he fell; Quick Harry poised to execute that harm That soon would send him kicking heel to hell. And this advantage quickly moved to seize: Himself still armed, his rival on his knees. 

But as in life beyond a paper fame, Oft the things we mean to do miscarry Or never realized, or change in aim, Purpose, circumstance, or name. So Harry, Like a painted character dumbly stood And let his doubting “should” o’erwhelm his “would.” 

And in that space where silent counsel streams, Entire worlds of words conveyed through gaze, The time between did pass like sluggish dream   Like years and not some seconds passed in haze.   So youth and age, dark and dark, fame and fame, Like statues stared, dumb in unfinished game.   

The winds without had calmed, as eye of storm, Before a thunderclap the silence rent; The air did lose its biting frost and warmed, Which all of mercy’s hope in second spent. So to it went again the foes; but then Wands met in Priori Incantatem. 

A golden thread the several streams enjoined, The honeyed warmth that, streaming, intercourse; A rushing surge of pow’r in chaffing loins That meet with fervor in deep-throated force. Two wills in one, and one in that one will, In battle fought; but impasse kept them still. 

The spell forced memory; the wands confessed Each wrathful kill, each calculated hurt. Not one did stint in shame, but rather tressed In essence same, though meeting briefly curt. How loath the one to undo its brother! How warm they greeted, like open lover! 

And yet it could not be but their joy was brief: The phoenix of the holly trumped the yew, Though not without the pain of magic’s grief, That made its brother’s spell dissolve like dew. Oh sorrow’s cross, to bear that loving strife, To be the one to end beloved life! 

So Voldemort, then Voldevie, now naught, His riddle solved, but wants its puzzle piece, That in his raging sorrow desperate sought The pardon that would give his trial peace. Now dearly found, and dearer bought by youth, Who now stands heir to all his state and truth. 

The hush that fell, the fury’s storm’s recede, Though not a mite abated, made a pause To give a panting Harry back his need And room to bring the truth of triumphed cause, Before the joyful sight of living friend: The evil scarce begun has present end. 

But oh, what joy, what cheer did start And filled with lusty roar the bleak lacuna: For who did meet him, these loyal hearts, But Ron, Hermione, Neville, Luna? His faithful warriors, and more, and more, Did come to throng him at the door. 

Exhausted, weary, words but breath and air, He made no sound except to say his deed, And thought on nothing but his ended care, That sixteen years of strife did lead. And soon looked forward to a life well fed, With fierce-proud Ginny by his side to wed.  

With ringing bell, the Hogwarts flag was hung And draped across old Riddle senior’s hall. Requiems for the lost and hymns were sung To victory dearly won by brother’s fall. And triumph over wicked wizard dead, Now gone to goblin’s hell below sans head. 

For Tom Marvolo Riddle, his body found, Was tossed and thrown in playful wizard’s game, And for a trophy, as from bear or hound, Off went the severed head of wicked fame, To join his fiendish wife and cobra lover As butcher king in markless tomb uncovered. 

His eldest son, Fiori, now his heir, Was guarded for a time without his room, His treason known, that made him present fair By Harry, who made him a courtly groom. Although his tyrant sire’s blood did make Suspicion’s odorless smoke trail his wake. 

Fior did not last, but fared much better Than oily Malfoy, now past all earthly care, Or kindless Crabbe with brutish Trevor, Both fiendish fire’s meat of Ron the Bear. With Dolohov through, cut by Ginny’s curse, The rest were carted off for fate much worse. 

Then wisdom blanched, his trickling tale he stayed. I, in puzzlement, inquired for his health. “Oh, fie,” he moaned. “I was a fool to say What none should dare for all his land and wealth! But enough. ‘Tis done, and I must perforce Vouchsafe my life in safety’s hidden course.” 

And so I wait, evading looming fate, My mystery hid deep in key-locked breast. This final thought that good with ill equates Confounds me so it’s loath to leave me rest: What laden price for soul to understand The story monsters made from riddled man! 

Finis.

[monleonrpg]

WELCOME TO MONLEON:

FULL NAME: Natalie Nordegraf

OCCUPATION: Musician, Record Producer and DJ

AGE & D.O.B.: 26 / March 10th, 1994

RESIDENCE: Foncebadón

ORIGINALLY FROM:  Monleon, Florida

HOW LONG THEY’VE BEEN IN TOWN: 17 years

BIOGRAPHY:

TW: light mentions of drugs and abandonment

Raised between New York and Florida, Natalie Nordegraf’s life was always a dichotomy of pushes and pulls, but then again, they were the type who loved working against the status quo. Their earliest memories were of white picket fences, people coming to their beck and call, and the quaint, pictorial scenes from their bedroom balcony―marble fountains and a great verdant lawn where they usually ran about, lost in a world of their own. Their early life was very much a spectacle: behind the scenes, nannies and professional caretakers played the part of their mother, and in the spotlight, on dark stages before the flashing paraphernalia of paparazzi, their mother played the part she had forsaken for the sake of freedom. Natalie, far from being a true conglomerate of Charlotte’s ornamental grandeur and Thomas’ natural born charisma, tried to smile through it all despite their discomfort with being in the spotlight, both a shot of malt and its remedy combined in a sweet dose, auburn-haired and brown eyed, a flaming glory which was only waiting for morning to bloom.

A pop of color in any landscape and incredibly ironic in a sense that was often viewed as different; they were the giggle at the funeral, the kid living in the phrase “go big or go home”. Growing up as a small celebrity in a big state, it wasn’t only the family money (vintage Porches, two rugged Golden retrievers, a snapping flagpole in the circular drive through), but the reputation which preceded them; which came to define the Nordegraf’s only child. Their family had long forged a straight and scenic path before Natalie, smoothing out every possible inconvenience that could have risen. Thomas was the money and the name, Charlotte his beloved, docile wife; and Natalie—well, Natalie was the one who seemed to break up the image of their perfect family, the one who appeared in the doorway, bright-eyed and tousle-haired, clothes stained with grass stains. Wild, unrefined.

Natalie was born with the kind of brain that took some growing into. Not necessarily on their part; they never questioned their own peculiarity when it was the rest of the world that seemed to lag a pace behind. Truthfully, Natalie was happy to be Natalie, but they were never happy being lonely. They loved having friends, few as they came, fleeting as they were. Lanky for their age and awkward, they sought out human connections eagerly and did not fail for lack of trying; making other kids like you was just a little harder when they seemed to exist on a different wavelength, and communication across frequencies didn’t come easily to them. When everyone else rushed outside to play kickball or hopscotch, Natalie spent their recess indoors—tapping at the glass of the classroom’s monarch tank, craning their neck nearly ninety degrees to solemnly peer at the hanging chrysalises. When the girls were chatting away about TV shows and giggling about their classroom crushes, Natalie tried to join in with a lively discussion about the latest Lord of the Rings book they’d just finished or their current favorite band to listen to—but got nothing but dirty looks in return. Once, after watching everyone else trade Pokemon cards at lunch, Natalie had brought in hand-made cards of their own creature inventions and shared them around happily. They’d found them all crumpled in the trash at the end of the day, the drawings crudely vandalized. At the time, they didn’t really understand it, but the reason for their ostracization was simple: “gifted” did not cancel out “weird” in the eyes of other fifth-graders.

So like most oddballs and offbeats, childhood was simply a waiting game for Natalie. There eventually came a time when being different was no longer the leprosy of the playground, and dragging around an over creative mind didn’t always get in the way of every social interaction they attempted. Being quirky was no longer weird; it was admirable, enviable, a label that came with it’s own inverted cool factor even in the face of the letterman-wearing jocks and pony-tailed cheerleaders. Now that the barriers had been lifted, their friendly and extroverted personality left them with no shortage of friends. Their quirks flourished in the company of those who could appreciate them. High school was also an era of enlightenment for Natalie in other ways; with their extraordinary knack for learning multiple instruments and blossoming love of all things artistic, they’d never even realized how starved they’d been on the music and art curriculum of their previous years until they started teaching themself. From the first time they learned to read sheet music to holding a guitar in their hands, they felt the click of something falling rightfully in it’s place. It didn’t get much closer to love at first sight than that.

For someone who’s brain had seemed to have a decent enough start, their personality took longer to fully bloom. Maybe it was those early years of classroom and home isolation that had stunted it, or the fact that even their identity needed some time to catch up with their creative flow; whatever the case, only by their last years of high school did the “weird girl” start to resemble the real Natalie Veronica Nordegraf: finally coming out as queer and non-binary, of eccentric style, multiplying tattoos, and the speaking rate of a NASCAR engine. The strange, colorful appearance gave off one impression; opening their mouth into an excited conversation about making synthesized music beats or the latest episode of Attack on Titan turned it into entirely another. By the time they embarked upon their four years at University, Natalie had self-actualized into such a bundle of contradictions that everything about them seemed designed purely to baffle people—but truthfully, they were never the kind of person to blueprint their personality.

Their parents decided that it was better off keeping their one and only child away from the spotlight for fear of extreme scrutiny concerning their peculiar nature. Unsurprising as Natalie hadn’t ever truly felt seen by their parents—especially after coming out. Their relationship with Charlotte and Thomas was always a difficult one, if anything non-existent. Still, when Natalie was just a freshman in college, their mother had a mid-life stroke and it affected them all the same. Natalie was ready and willing to drop all their classes and fly home on the next available flight, but their father assured them there was no need for such drastic measures—they were to stick to their studies, and things would be just fine at home. And they were, for a while. Charlotte battled her way through a long, slow recovery to retrain some of the functions she’d lost, and regain pieces of the charismatic, sharp-witted woman she’d always been—until the second stroke blindsided them all. This bleed was worse than the last. It was a hemorrhage Hiroshima that wilted Charlotte Nordegraf overnight, and wiped her personality clean like a hard drive. Natalie didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye to their mother—the real Charlotte, not the empty husk that had replaced her by the next morning.

Their mother’s steep and sudden decline was a fissure that would eventually crack the family completely in two; Natalie, helpless and frustrated in grief, found themself blaming their father for not prioritizing their own mother over a year or two of school. Maybe being at home would’ve helped her. Maybe it would’ve changed things. The crack soon widened into a chasm when their father admitted that he was looking into long-term care facilities that could provide for his wife better than he could; Natalie protested vehemently, but argument after argument amounted to nothing. From that moment on, Natalie let the distance between them grow without so much as another phone call. Taking on one part-time job, then another, Natalie found that a constant stream of work kept their brain a little too exhausted for them to continue on with their studies. Eventually, instead of becoming a security blanket school became a burden; and Natalie found themself dropping out.

The next three years passed by in a blur after that; they shacked up with some friends turned roommates, got a few new tattoos, learned more instruments, and tried to focus more on their passions despite the unresolved trauma they carried with them. Eventually, Natalie moved inside the old house that their father never frequented and that they grew up in—entirely too large for one person but they found a small solace in the space surprisingly. Ever since, Natalie has tried to anchor their life as best as they could in their hometown. Though their family is now a family of their own choosing: people who love them as unapologetically as Natalie loves them. Though their heart may still ache for what has been lost, it’s a pain that will soften with time; for now, they are content to find comfort simply in belonging. All those years of loneliness, all that time spent hungering for friends to call their own, and it’s back home in Monleon that they’d found their place—and the utmost fulfillment of a puzzle piece that’s finally discovered where it fits.

They prefer to dwell in the positive. Natalie’s passions include music, playing gigs with their band Dommy Mommy Propaganda, gaming, learning to play new instruments, animals, burgers, fries, beer, and lots of weed. On a typical night out, Natalie will be amiable, easygoing, give off a lot of himbo/bimbo energy while being effortlessly awkward. As they talk weightlessly, you may notice a sadness lurking behind their eyes. As they swig their beer, you may also notice them absently thumbing the tiny, claw-machine silver pendant that hangs around their neck—the rare gift from their mother. Though they still dare to dream big; they are currently getting into producing and putting more of their music out there.

NATALIE NORDEGRAF is portrayed by BRIGETTE LUNDY-PAINE and written by TOMMIE.

[prussiantique]

Ode to Hushabye Valley – Notes

Sweet and sincere; apropos for the good lady @hushabyevalley​ whose art inspired it, I should hope. Here’s the usual note that accompanies most of my poetry, and I must apologise: it’s long and while I would be overjoyed if one were to read it, I do realise it’s not particularly interesting. Nonetheless, I would like to explain the hows and whys of a dedicatory poem, so if you want to understand all the allusions of the poem, please read the bit up till the second line of ‘===’s. Under those will be a more technical look into the workings of the poem. If you happen to stick with me from start to finish, then you have my sincerest thanks :) === So, the poem begins with an invocation to Hushabye, the eponymous lady of both the fantastical valley and the castle that is situated therein. Please visit the good lady here or here. Now, world-building is a fundamental aspect of high fantasy and science-fiction, and the world of Hushabye Valley is, at least to me, one that is suffused with romance, timelessness, fantasy, and quiet pathos,– something which I find in all three of the good lady’s ‘tales’: Hushabye Valley (fantasy), Calabi Yau Forest (fantasy), and Ada (sci-fi, but otherwise suffused with the same charm as the others). While the combination is becoming far more popular these days, high fantasy and slice-of-life are not related genres traditionally, as high fantasy is predominantly preoccupied with grand narratives and quests (think C. S. Lewis or J. R. R. Tolkein) while slice-of-life is focused on the memorable moments of everyday life. I find the good lady makes them work wonderfully well, hence the rather odd turn of phrase in ‘complete with beauty, mild and grand’. ‘Mild and grand’ are not cognate ideas, but by placing them both as interlinked qualities of a singular ‘beauty’, it (hopefully) suggests the all-encompassing nature of the splendours that Hushabye portrays in the valley. Puns and allusions are important in an ode of this kind: in a celebratory poem, it should be evident to the addressee exactly what it is that they have done or created that has garnered said praise. In equal measure, if one is sincere about one’s praise or admiration, one’s writing should show a certain amount of knowledge and love of that which is spoken. Some of these are, admittedly rather straightforward, such as ‘misty’, which alludes to the good lady’s tumblr ask: ‘Throw a question into the mist’; ‘a face of marble’, to the rather adorable groundskeeper and main character of Hushabye Valley, Marble; and ‘the archways of a bygone year’, to the banner of Hushabye Valley’s Patreon page. The last one is a little tenuous, if I had to be honest, as the emphasis in the banner is on the four plinths that flank Marble, but I felt ‘archways’ scanned better poetically than ‘plinth’. If I had to use ‘plinth’ instead, I’d have rewritten the line as a hexameter one thus: “Between the plinths engraved with words long worn away;” ‘Queer’ is another word I chose due to its double meaning, due to both its more traditional sense of strange or unusual,– and thus apropos to describe the faerie aspect of Hushabye’s ‘tales,– as well as the presence of yuri/girls’ love therein. I do realise that queer is a complicated word today, but I hope the phrase ‘love sincere’ dispels any doubts regarding which side of the fence my sympathies sit regarding the matter. The word ‘art’ ties into the idea of magic and fantasy as magic, like alchemy, was considered a branch of learning historically, and thus described in the same way we would talk about liberal arts. Of course, Hushabye herself is an accomplished artist of the visual kind, making this another fairly straightforward piece of wordplay. ‘Enfold me in your art’ is just something that I ask of good narratives: I like being immersed in something if I sincerely enjoy it. This ties into the last line and my word choice therein. Castle Hushabye is ‘a fonder home’ to the speaker of the poem, and it’s important to note the use of ‘fonder’ quite specifically. ‘Fonder’ is a comparative adjective, and when considered alongside the context of the speaker, who is evidently a traveller, it suggests that home or haven offered by Hushabye is a place that the speaker finder more loving (not merely lovely) than wherever the speaker originated from. Considering the state of the world today, I would happily escape into the good lady’s worlds and narratives and stay there. While reading, I am reminded of one of Tennyson’s lyric interludes from The Princess: The splendour falls on castle walls                And snowy summits old in story:         The long light shakes across the lakes,                And the wild cataract leaps in glory. Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.         O hark, O hear! how thin and clear,                And thinner, clearer, farther going!         O sweet and far from cliff and scar                The horns of Elfland faintly blowing! Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying: Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.         O love, they die in yon rich sky,                They faint on hill or field or river:         Our echoes roll from soul to soul,                And grow for ever and for ever. Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying, And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying. Beauty and pathos mixed into one, much like the good lady’s tales. <3 === Now to the more dry and technical parts of the piece. If you’ve no interest in the mechanics of poetry, feel free to head off. I promise I won’t mind. I will admit, the poem was intended to be a far longer work when I first started work on it, but that was quickly whittled down when I decided it’d be an acrostic. Long poems are, in addition, generally not something that most people enjoy reading. As this was a poem intended to be read by the good lady herself, it had to be kept short. The main thing I am genuinely unsatisfied with is the unusual rhyme scheme. It’s not irregular, per se, but rather it lacks a certain symmetry that I would have liked to have seen in a poem for someone whose work I sincerely enjoy. The poem’s rhyme scheme follows thus (each letter representing a rhyme word): a b b a c d d c || d e e d f f The ‘d’ rhyme appears four times in the poem as opposed to the two times of every other rhyme, which is, from a poet’s perspective both incongruous and weird in a rather untidy way. Now, ideally, the rhyme scheme of the poem would have looked like this: a b b a c d d c || e f f e g g which would have been better as each quatrain is kept self-contained in terms of rhyme; or, alternatively: a b b a b c c b || c d d c d d would have been another acceptable alternative, slowly phasing through interlocking rhymes in a similar manner to Terza Rima or the Spenserian stanza. An acrostic does pose a challenge poetically as, if I may put it this way, not all letters were created equal from a poetic stand-point. Different opening letters can create difficulties, whether it’s finding words with the correct rhythm or finding words that have a relevant meaning to the poem. Very frequently, the primary problem posed by an acrostic falls into one of three categories: words that begin with the correct letter but have absolutely nothing to do with the contents of the poem; words that fit perfectly into the poem but begin with the wrong letter; or words that have both the correctly letter and meaning but do not fit the rhythm. This last point is actually the cause of a great deal of the metrical irregularity of the piece, with frequent trochees,– as seen in the first foot of lines 1, 7, 9, 11 and 12,– and more occasional spondees,– as found in the first foot of lines 3, 4, and 14,– beginning the lines of what should be  predominantly iambic poem. Just a reminder for anyone who is less familiar with the poetic terminology, iambs, trochees, and spondees are metrical feet or stress patterns in poetry: iamb: ˘ ¯ or unstressed-stressed  (e.g. To be or not to be) trochee: ¯ ˘ or stressed-unstressed  spondee: ¯ ¯ or stressed-stressed In a short poem like this, one good skill to have is the ability to juggle the competing demands of metre and expression without being gagged by them. While one needs to express an idea within a confined space and obey the rules at the same time, one has to do things tastefully after all. An example of this would be in line 3:   ¯          ¯     /  ˘    ¯   /  ˘         ¯      /   ˘   ¯ / ˘     ¯ such   things   I   ere   had   scarce   partaken   in. While it does scan properly, it also falls rather awkwardly from a modern tongue due to the fairly archaic, but more flexible, syntax. Now if we were to expand it and rearrange the line into something more commonplace today, we can not only see how poetry condenses and re-patterns thought, but also how we ourselves have to ‘translate’ archaic poetry mentally to properly understand it.  Thus: such things I ere had scarce partaken in can be expanded to: such things [that] I [before] had [rarely] [taken part] in and can be further rearranged to make: such things [that] I had [rarely] [taken part in] [before] Moving onto structure: although I’ve split it into two stanzas, I would like to argue that the poem could and should be read, structurally, in three different ways: as an acrostic of two words, Hushabye and Valley; as an ode, with an unequal tripartite structure of strophe, antistrophe and epode; as a sonnet, with a false volta in line 9, and a true volta in line 13. I need not go into the acrostic, I think, as it’s probably the most straightforward part of the poem. The ode is where the invocation to ‘Hushabye’ plays its part. Ode are explicitly poems that laud something or someone. In addition, the structure of the poem’s primary movements can be split into three, albeit unequal parts: the strophe, in which the speaker invokes ‘Hushabye’ and describes the initial wonder that he/she experiences; the antistrophe, directed instead to the ‘Valley’ itself, where the beauty that is lauded by the strophe is exchanged from more enduring qualities like ‘tenderness’ and comfort, ‘as suggested by the word ‘languid’. The epode is the sudden change from invocation to imperative as can be seen in the verbs ‘Enfold’ and ‘bid’. As a sonnet, we have to read the poem as a single stanza. The rhyme scheme, however, supports this as it can neatly separate the poem into three quatrains and a couplet, the very same as many types of sonnet. From this perspective, the four lines beginning with ‘Valley’ instead belongs to the same continuum as ‘Hushabye’ and ‘A face…’, rather than being a distinct stanza of its own. This final way of looking at the poem, as a sonnet, is perhaps the only one which also offers a reason for the metrical shift in the final couplet. Rather than being in iambic pentameter, the two lines are actually alexandrines, i.e. iambic hexameter, with a caesura or break in the very middle of those lines, as can be clearly seen in: ‘Enfold me in your art, || and bid me never roam:’ The alexandrine is fairly unusual in English poetry but, when used in a predominantly pentametrical context, serves to slow the pace of the iambs and to create a falling motion, a perfect technique if one wanted to finish a poem in a manner that suggests as much affection as ease. === Long way to go, but if you’ve managed to get here, then you have my sincerest thanks and affection~