the writer's week ahead: 12.10.23-12.16.23

with a poem

Beloveds!

Aspect wise, as you’ll see, this is a blessedly light week. But. We have a New Moon tomorrow, and then Mercury stations retrograde on Wednesday — so, really, not that light a week at all. Much will be coming your way in the following days. Stay tuned. 

Also.

I have been buried under a freelance project whose deadline is coming due, and when I’ve popped up for air to engage with the world, my heart has been made heavy by the weight of collective grief of the ongoing horror in Palestine. In particular, the targeted IDF strike of beloved poet and literature professor Dr. Refaat Alareer has ricocheted across online academic spaces (this obituary at Literary Hub does him justice). 

You may well have seen his poem “If I Must Die,” written on November 1st of this year, shared already, but if you have not, please read it. And keep calling your representatives, and the White House hotline. And taking collective action, in spite of our government’s shameful, downright evil support and enabling of this genocide. 

Watching the poets and journalists of Gaza write their own obituaries in real time has left a mark on my soul.