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CRUEL/CRUEL
Playlist by Dior J. Stephens๐๐๐๐๐/๐๐๐๐๐ย is a collection of poems that seeks to radically deconstruct language in order to respond to theย unimaginable cruelties of living under the muddied boot of white heteropatriarchy. In the collection, Blackย musical tradition, queerness and race coalesce to emphasize the archival and documentary as intrinsic to ourย personal and collective survivals. It was critical for me to craft this collection into a hybrid visual and literaryย object. The visual is integral in the deconstruction and queer renewal of the, at times, dizzying and mystifyingย language found on the page.ย ๐๐๐๐๐/๐๐๐๐๐ย asks not that you understand it, butย feelย it-- wholly. Let it sing toย you.ย
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โ Dior J. Stephens
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Featured on April 17, 2023
Body Poem I
Playlist by Tyler Little๐๐ฐ๐ฅ๐บ ๐๐ฐ๐ฆ๐ฎ ๐ is an attempt at visualizing that which cannot be in the book. The body traces the page, sits, laments, obsesses, delights, and ultimately reveals the poem through interior and exterior labor. Rather than the poem itself being revealed to the viewer/reader, ๐๐ฐ๐ฅ๐บ ๐๐ฐ๐ฆ๐ฎ ๐ points towards the poet/artist in their continuous relationship to language. The body itself is made up of the possibilities of language wordings, soundings, and writings, and as these possibilities accumulate, the poet is further consumed and encased in the mantle of language, which propels them towards the poem. It is through these representative images that the life behind the page begins to make itself known.
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โ Tyler Little
View playlist to continue readingFeatured on April 10, 2023
Glory Hole
Playlist by Seagull BooksKim Hyun,ย ๐๐ญ๐ฐ๐ณ๐บ ๐๐ฐ๐ญ๐ฆย (Translated from the Korean by Suhyun J. Ahn and Archana Madhavan)
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Featuring gay teens, elders, cats, caterpillars, robots, and other unexpected characters, Kimโs fifty-one eccentric poems trace themes of love, sexual desire, abandonment, destitution, and death. In recounting the splendid yet tragic journeys of his speakers, Kim defies meaningful sense-making. His poems are a mishmash of dystopian sci-fi and pornography, storytelling and poetry, fictive references, and real figures. They are not embellished with elegant imagery; in fact, they are antithetical to it, opting instead for incoherent tense, unidiomatic expressions, and never-ending puns. After all, like LGBTQ+ people in many cultures, Korean queers live in this site of violence. Bewilderment, deliberately, is Kim Hyunโs form.ย All the "notes" are the author's own, even when attributed to others.ย ๐๐ญ๐ฐ๐ณ๐บ ๐๐ฐ๐ญ๐ฆย invites readers into a very queer world.ย
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South Korean authorย Kim Hyunย debuted as a poet in 2009 when his five poems including โBlow Jobโ were featured in the quarterlyย ๐๐ข๐ฌ๐ฌ๐ข ๐๐ฆ๐จ๐บ๐ฆ. Since then, Kim has published several poetry and essay collections. He has also co-authored a feminist novel collectionย ๐๐ช๐ด๐ช๐ต๐ฐ๐ณ๐ด ๐ข๐ต ๐๐ข๐ธ๐ฏ, a queer novel collection ๐๐ช๐ง๐ฆ ๐๐ด ๐๐ญ๐ธ๐ข๐บ๐ด ๐ฐ๐ฏ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐๐ณ๐ช๐ฏ๐ฌ ๐ฐ๐ง ๐๐ฐ๐ญ๐ญ๐ข๐ฑ๐ด๐ช๐ฏ๐จ, and the young adult queer anthology,ย ๐๐ฐ ๐๐ฆ ๐๐ฐ๐ท๐ฆ.ย Kim has received the Shin Dong-yup Prize for Literature and Kim Jun-seong Literary Award.
View playlist to continue readingFeatured on April 3, 2023
Second Nature
Playlist by Elena Comay del JuncoThis is a condensation of a chapbook, Second Nature, itself assembled from scraps left over from a now (of course) abandoned novel. It's about the usual things: sex, youth, the internet, the suburbs, habits (good and/or bad).
--Elena Comay del Junco