A beacon in the waning light

Clinging to hope

Updates on Newsletter Schedule

It’s the end of the month, and this is the only email for the month, yet again: my poem to paid subscribers. This month, I am sharing it with all of you. I am at six months of being a mother to two children, and I must admit I am still getting my footing with what it looks like to care for two while accomplishing the tasks my work requires of me.

The last two months were the busiest for my “day job” which is to be an observer of another sort, photographing weddings and families. This year more than ever, I have felt the connection of my work as a writer and community builder to my work as a wedding photographer. It all melds together, but I apologize that you haven’t had more emails from me in your inbox these last two months. I hope the emails you received are meaningful, and I hope you feel connected to something because of them. Maybe it is the water, maybe it is each other, maybe it is yourself. I know that this practice is connecting me to all of the above, and I intend to increase the frequency of my notes beginning in November. Thank you for your patience with me as I adjust.

Starting in November (which is already tomorrow), paid subscribers will receive two poems a month, and I hope to send an essay to all my subscribers as well. In the new year, I will send out a newsletter weekly, alternating between paid poem posts and essay posts for all subscribers. Thank you for reading, for encouraging me to share more, and for continuing to share my words with others.

Our Interdependence is the Beacon

Community care has been at the forefront of my mind these last few years. Since moving back to my rural village and welcoming our second child over the last year, I have been thinking daily about what it looks like to live an interdependent life. How powerful it is to be connected to other people; how necessary.

I feel this power of interdependence, as well as the strength of its inverse, especially now, as many around the world are coming together to fight for Palestinian liberation and as we watch the atrocities unfolding in Gaza. It is heartbreaking to witness and surreal that so much information comes to us through a screen in our hands when we are alone. This disconnected connectedness heightens continued "othering" as we discuss world crises in comment threads instead of face-to-face. When we feel separate from other humans, it becomes easier to label them as dangerous.

I keep thinking of a book I read this summer: "How We Show Up: Reclaiming Family, Friendship, and Community" by Mia Birdsong. It invites us to rethink the status quo, and to dream of a future that is interdependent. In it, she quotes Ruthie Wilson Gilmore, prison abolitionist and American geographer, where she writes, "Real security is not locking up more and more people. Real security is knowing you have shelter, that you will have food, that you will have beauty in your life. That you have a future, that your family has a future."

I think of these words this week as innocent Palestinians continue to be killed in the name of “security,” after their rights and land have been systemically taken from them for decades. This is not security; this will not create safety. What Palestinians want is freedom and a future for their children. It is what we all want and deserve.

Our liberation is bound to each other's, and our strength comes from connection to each other. As we protest, as we call our representatives, as we talk with our neighbors, write, pray, care for our children, share meals, etc., may we remember that we are working towards a liberated future for us all. 

I have been working on a number of poems all month, and this one I am sharing is probably not done yet. I enjoy using this newsletter platform because it enables me to share works in progress, to self-publish what may not yet be “finished”. Sharing pieces is always vulnerable, and this month especially I have to remind myself of the importance of simply showing up, even if it is imperfectly. I know I won’t always get it right, but it is essential to be present.

I appreciated these words from Joy Sullivan’s newsletter last week: “We don’t know if it helps, and it doesn’t matter. We act even without certainty. We reach for justice though she hides her face. We move in the direction of hope, even in the dark.”

So here is my offering, nature guiding me as always to pay attention to heartache, to genocide, to climate disasters. To be broken wide open yet somehow to still “reach for justice” and “move in the direction of hope”.

A Beacon Out of Season

This October, when the forsythia leaves turned
from green to purple, the flowers strangely bloomed
out of season. Beckoned, I imagine, 
by summer heat that met us in autumn, 
a comfortable reminder
of a world about to end.

That same week, we learned
of mass murders committed
under the guise of safety, a right
to defend itself, world leaders claim. 
The people join together. Dissent 
grows louder in the streets.

Yellow blossoms 
out quiet windows, a warning sign. 
Yes, the world is ending, 
or perhaps something else
entirely. A beacon in the waning light,
collective calls for future beauty.

Founding Members

Postcards for October are in the mail! Keep an eye on your mailbox. A reminder that I offer poem subscriptions on my website if you’d like to purchase just a few months for yourself or a friend.

I hope you are all well, and that you find yourself connected to each other this week. May we continue to open our eyes to the suffering of our fellow humans while questioning the structures that keep us unaware.

Cheers,
Mae