With a hop, skip and jump, Algy landed in the midst of the beautiful glowing grasses which lit up the drier areas of the peat bogs and moorland when the sun managed to shine in the latter part of the year.
As he floated on a sea of autumn colour, Algy revelled in the fabulous patchwork of his bed, for he was surrounded by every possible hue of russet, red and gold, with accents of tantalising green still mixed in to provide a palette which any painter would be justly proud of.
Resting gently on the soft grasses, Algy resolved to spend a lazy Sunday just drifting and dreaming, while there was still some warmth in the world. As he dozed happily in a golden reverie, sometimes half awake and sometimes half asleep, a sweet wee verse he had once read in a book kept repeating itself over and over in his head, like the comforting drone of the bees somewhere out of sight on the last remaining heather:
Golden in the garden,
Golden in the glen,
Golden, golden, golden
September’s here again!
Golden in the tree tops,
Golden in the sky—
Golden, golden, golden
September’s going by!
Algy hopes that you will all have a happy, lazy Sunday too 🧡
[Algy is quoting September, a wee rhyme by the little known early 20th century American children's poet Annette Wynne.]
"if you were a rosebud i'd help you grow, if you were a myth you'd be achilles and i, thetis, if you were a iphigenia i would be clytemnestra, if you were troilus i would be apollo for you, if the sun rises or the moon comes to take you from me i shall rest your body at peace"
-i wrote a poem for my honorary kid i adore he is my little sunshine <3
“Oh Rascal Children of Gaza” by Palestinian poet, Khaled Juma.
He was born and raised in Al-Shaboura Palestinian Refugee Camp, in the Gaza Strip. He lives there to this day. Before Israel’s latest war crimes, he worked as a school teacher and writer.
I want black children to be seen as children and not treated like adults. I don’t want black boys to be targeted as black men or black girls to be written off as “acting too grown.”
I want them to pursue their interests and dreams and not have anyone stand in their way. I want them to grow up and only know racism as a thing of the past, something that’s never happened to them.
I want them to be loved, and safe, and supported and respected.
When I was a child of only three
The Rotted man came for me
late one night from my open door
he slowly crept across the floor
he took me by the hand and said
I’ll save you from this life of dread
we left the house in the early morn
and took his carriage of blackened thorn
we rode for hours through thick dense fog
to a darkened unlit swamp filled bog
where top-less trees with hanging moss
were shields from the unseen winter frost
the thick wet heat from the dense cool air
crept up your back and through your hair
he took me to his house of bones
on a path laid with cobble stones
upon his door hung a head
of a child with hair of fiery red
his hall was bathed in blood red tile
the walls were stacks of flesh in piles
He told me of his protective view
and begged that I should join him too
He smiled and through his rotted lips
I saw a thousand children’s fingertips
He promised me the world would pay
and told me that I could stay
Then we entered a smaller room
and the rotted man gave me a red balloon
Then I saw my mom through tinted glass
The man with her was talking fast
The tears were pouring from her eyes
The man then held her while she cried
Then the Rotted man did the strangest thing,
He sat down with me and began to sing.
A soft nice tune that filled my head
With puppy dogs and fresh baked bread
It was then I notice that the rotted man
Was simply old and had a tan,
And then my mom burst in the room
The feel of warmth, her sweet perfume
She hugged me tight and swore to me
From here on out, Dad would let us be.
No more bruises no more fights,
No more screaming in the night,
The rotted man had saved our lives,
By taking those who beat their wives,
And children that cry when they’re dropped,
And are beaten senseless until they stop,
I thank the Rotted man a lot,
And never have I forgot,
That the thing I feared, saved my life,
They had found my father with a knife,
There are real horrors on this earth,
Some are subjected to them at birth,
We were saved by a man made of rot,
I was lucky, but many are not.
The idea that uni protesters are "elitist ivy-league rich kids larping as revolutionaries" on Twitter and Reddit and even here is so fucking funny to me if you actually know anything about the student bodies at these unis. Take it from someone who's going to one of the biggest private unis in the US, 80% of the peers I know are either from the suburbs or an apartment somewhere in America, children of immigrants, or here on a student visa. I've heard about one-percenter students, but I've never met one in person. Like, don't get me wrong, the institution as a whole is still very privileged and white. I've talked with friends and classmates about feeling weird or dissonant being here and coming from such a different background. But in my art program, I see BIPOC, disabled, queer, lower-income students and faculty trying to deconstruct and tear that down and make space every day. So to take a cursory glance at a crowd of student protesters in coalitions that are led by BIPOC & 1st/2nd-gen immigrant students and HQ'd in ethnic housings and student organizations and say, "ah. children of the elite." Get real.