shipwreck journals

things people have told me

  • it's not about the tootie, it's about the frootie!
  • but, how do you know what's to happen?
  • if you can't buy it twice, you can't buy it once.
  • you remind me of nikki giovanni.
  • you seem like you're walking on air, but you're so grounded at the same time.

quizzes

links

z-library

free access to a wide range of books

zotero

open-source organizer for research notes, collection, and citations

ellipsus

alternative for google docs

writing philosophy

writing, for me, began as an escape and then transitioned into a way to reflect. i've been writing for a long time, been to writing camps galore across state lines. but, the writing process something that changes along with a writer. i do not use ai for any part of the process. i write mainly on paper first, then type, then paper again. sometimes, i write in coffee shops, by the water, or on ao3 because it gives me a bit of mmph! while undergrad left little time for creative writing, i did take a few classes to work out those muscles. my editing method is by printing my work out then cutting and re-arranging. i adopted this editing method from Eudora Welty, a famous Mississippi writer, where she prints out her work, cuts them up, and moves them around. mentally, this editing method helps me see my thought process between the first draft and final draft.

favorite books

characters i relate to in fiction


louis du pointe du lac, interview with a vampire
jackson marchetti, sex education

ongsa, 23.5

josie, bottoms

carmy, the bear


fou4mod, gelboys

obit

      after victoria chang

smokey died—three times oddly, first death sounded of wet wheels turning too fast    too far

the ramp spun his grey body from pavement to grass    the organs inside him rattled   

rattlesnake skin tracking the grass; smokey first death      being too dangerous for a 20mph ramp

his second death came in a parking lot     petsmart    he sat waiting     watching my violation

until a vibration pushed his engine into motion        his lights brightened, smoke roaring to push the virus out of him           he lulled me to sleep      bloodmoon-tears cascade    we died together


final death     thanksgiving break     at 24 years old, smokey was dead for 24 years    stolen

since 1998 from new york        now he is impounded      or the car of a police force gone stealth

dead all along      an even death    we laughed alone

inspiration:

during my freshman year of college, my mom tried to register my car "smokey," but she almost got arrested. apparently, he was reported stolen from new york, but he was found in the South in decades later…

connecting flights

life is but layovers.

what do you do in that small sliver of time, those hours where there’s nothing to go to?

waiting for what’s in the future,

places never explored      experiences never felt      people never seen

how uncomfortable are those minutes

of pacing through terminals?

you’re simply a person passing by,

a passerby for everyone around you.

what weight does your existence hold

once you look out that window, what do you wait to see?

maybe wings caressing the clouds              winds fluttering the metal             those yellow orbs

stars on the ground                            heaven found in our own sphere               

so much life in that glitter, blinking like curious eyes

who do you wait to see?                  how beautiful it is to go unnoticed

watch the walkways move

rushing briefcases to their next meeting                   crying toddlers with their headphones

young adults escaping    to those new places          new experiences                 new people

the briefcases and the headphones             departing hugs and reuniting kisses

is not life full of waiting?               patiently waiting for the touchdown       and take off

prompts

i'm always collecting prompts either by talking to people or just by being online.
  1. what’s one trait you see in other people that you wish you had. why do you not possess this characteristic yourself?
  2. what are your core values as a human being? what’s the most important to you? what are you morally passionate about?
  3. which emotion do you tend to deal with in unhelpful/destructive ways? write about the way you usually deal with this troublesome emotion. then write about what your life might be like if you dealt with it differently.
  4. consider yourself at your worst - at a point where all of your most negative and disruptive traits have come to the surface. capture that version of you in your mind. then write a letter of love, understanding and compassion to that version of you. (for extra credit: read the letter aloud to yourself whenever you feel like you've turned into a bit of a monster!)
  5. what negative emotions do you tend to avoid? why might this be?
  6. what are you afraid of? what are you doing about it?
  1. someone just knocked on your door and stood for three minutes. then, they went into your backyard and began to take pictures. what led up to this point, and what happens next?
  2. take three disparate objects randomly from your purse, backpack, or shelves. set them in front of you and begin writing, allowing fifteen minutes for each object. see if you can use a common image or theme to bind these together.—adapted from brenda miller, writing creative nonfiction.
  3. write about a small death, a grief that you didn't realize until later. | "obit" by victoria chang

loved pieces

"ego tripping"
   — nikki giovanni

I was born in the congo
I walked to the fertile crescent and built
the sphinx
I designed a pyramid so tough that a star
that only glows every one hundred years falls
into the center giving divine perfect light
I am bad

I sat on the throne
drinking nectar with Allah
I got hot and sent an ice age to europe
to cool my thirst
My oldest daughter is nefertiti
the tears from my birth pains
created the nile
I am a beautiful woman

I gazed on the forest and burned
out the sahara desert
with a packet of goat's meat
and a change of clothes
I crossed it in two hours
I am a gazelle so swift
so swift you can't catch me

For a birthday present when he was three
I gave my son hannibal an elephant
He gave me rome for mother's day
My strength flows ever on

My son noah built new/ark and
I stood proudly at the helm
as we sailed on a soft summer day
I turned myself into myself and was
Jesus
men intone my loving name
All praises All praises
I am the one who would save

I sowed diamonds in my back yard
My bowels deliver uranium
the filings from my fingernails are
semi-precious jewels
On a trip north
I caught a cold and blew
My nose giving oil to the arab world
I am so hip even my errors are correct
I sailed west to reach east and had to round off
the earth as I went
The hair from my head thinned and gold was laid
across three continents

I am so perfect so divine so ethereal so surreal
I cannot be comprehended except by my permission

I mean...I...can fly
like a bird in the sky...

"The Real Prayers Are Not the Words, But the Attention that Comes First"
   — Mary Oliver

The little hawk leaned sideways and, tilted, rode the wind. Its eye at this distance looked like green glass; its feet were the color of butter. Speed, obviously, was joy. But then, so was the sudden, slow circle it carved into the slightly silvery air, and the squaring of its shoulders, and the pulling into itself the sharp-edged wings, and the falling into the grass where it tussled a moment, like a bundle of brown leaves, and then, again, lifted itself into the air, that butter-color clenched in order to hold a small, still body, and it flew off as my mind sang out oh all that loose, blue rink of sky, where does it go to, and why?