on reimagined fairytales, Bay Area poetry news, and the creative process
yes, we can have nice things // 05
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Hi friends,
Hope you all had a lovely weekend. Offering up a short but sweet edition of nice things this week as I’m feeling a little under the weather today but still wanted to get this out on Monday. Another eclectic mix of recommendations, this one featuring some really good modern fairytale and magical realism stuff (which takes up quite a lot of space in my brain, if I’m being honest); fun Bay Area poetry news; and a couple great pieces about the creative process and journey—i.e. how you really know when a piece is ready to be out in the world, whether it’s an essay or a book.
Coming up very soon are both my Pisces season breakdown and promised Saturn return pieces!
Little reminder that I accept submissions for nice things! If interested in sharing, please email yours to kimiawrites@gmail.com to potentially be featured. You can also drop shorter submissions in the comments. I’m happy to cite you by name and link out to your Substack or other email newsletter if you have one. Rather be anonymous? Just let me know.
1. I’m currently reading The Starlit Wood, a short story anthology of lesser-known, reimagined fairytales from a variety of critically acclaimed writers, the majority of them women. I’m a sucker for this kind of collection, and have absolutely recommended another of Dominik Parisien and Navah Wolfe’s anthologies, The Mythic Dream, on CK at some point. So far so good.
2. In a similar vein, I started watching Carnival Row, and it’s quickly become a compulsive watch. While the acting can be cheesy (sorry, but I’m looking at you, Cara Delevingne), the world building is pretty compelling. I mean, it’s a neo-noir fantasy series built into a Victorian-adjacent setting, featuring mythological creatures running amok. I’ll continue eating it up.
3. Kelly Link’s The Faery Handbag is a stunning short story I discovered while doing the thing where I can’t sleep at night so I read until the early hours instead. When magical realism is good, it’s incomparable for me. I can lose myself for hours, and in the writing of it? Completely disassociate, forget entirely that I have a body. When I refer to the creative process as as a kind of channeling, this is exactly what I mean. It is positively divine.
4. I cannot stop thinking about this lost interview with the late, great Clarice Lispector, via the New Yorker.
5. A wonderful little news segment featuring Bay Area poets reading from their work each week.
6. A public library vending machine, otherwise known as San Francisco’s very first “Book Stop” kiosk, is now open on Treasure Island. All you need is a library card! I am well and truly obsessed with everything about this.
7. Wish I’d taken a photo of the goods, but I just so happened along the cutest, most wholesome little bakery—literally, it’s called Wholesome Bakery—on Divisadero St. while running an errand the other day. Jalapeno bagel baked in-house? Check. Plant-based cream cheese? Check. Delicious chaga mushroom matcha latte? Check, check, and check!
8. I’ve realized that I am no longer addicted to Instagram. (!) Since getting back on it after months away, I do not engage in mindless scrolling; nor am I met with a persistent need to document everything so that I can then post it on stories. What a gorgeous, gorgeous feeling.
9. I’ve been thinking a lot about body neutrality—the growing movement around accepting our bodies as is, and when I say “as is,” I mean exactly as they are today. Rolls, dimples, wrinkles, stretch marks, acne spots, other perceived flaws and all. Not how we want them to be, nor how they were pre-pandemic.
The unpleasant truth of body positivity is that for many it seems unattainable. Neutrality, on the other hand, tells us we don’t have to force it, essentially removing the “toxic positivity” from the movement. It helps me in acknowledging that maybe I’m never going to love certain parts of myself physically, but the first step to being able to do that is accepting they are there, and it’s okay. Accepting myself as I am in this very moment.
10. Thoroughly enjoyed this short essay on sharing writing before it’s entirely ready, via Brevity Mag by way of Sari Botton’s
newsletter. An important reminder that you really can’t rush the process when it comes to putting out or sharing your writing, especially if it’s creative nonfiction (something I definitely struggle with!).11. Writer Allie Rowbottom on believing in yourself and your work, via The Creative Independent. So much goodness, I couldn’t pick a single nugget to quote here; it is absolutely worth the full read.
12. The poem, “Cosmic Cooking,” by Gretchen Tessmer, via Kaleidotrope. What fun.
And lastly, your witch tip of the week:
13. The spring equinox, or Ostara; Persian New Year; and the start of Aries season are all just a week away! Obviously, the time for spring cleaning (and energetic cleansing) is here—although I don’t think it’s ever a bad time to cleanse your front door or entryway, considering just how much chi, as in feng shui, or good or bad energy is constantly flowing in and out of your home that way.
After cleaning your front door, use a washcloth to apply peppermint essential oil mixed with water to usher in luck and abundance. Or, spritz it down with a rosemary essential oil spray to encourage clarity, insight, and stress relief. If you’d like, you can then burn a bundle of your favorite herbs to further cleanse with smoke. (Be sure to open all your windows while doing so to usher any remaining stale or stagnant energy out of your space.)
If you enjoyed reading this post, please feel free to click the ❤️ button so that more people can discover it on Substack!
xx Kimia