Women Who Submit

A personal note this time around: I hope this post finds you and your loved ones healthy and safe during these trying times. I’m glad to be able to share this roundup and to be part of such a supportive community. Congrats to the published writers and be well to all! Laura

From Lisa Eve Cheby‘s “Taking Stock” at Verse-Virtual:

I conduct inventory: 
Chad and Ed are sick, Priya is better, 
Doug is improved, Jon is still healthy. 
A friend’s father died, 
as did a stranger’s. 
Widows forced to grieve alone. 

From “Modern Archaeology” by Lituo Huang at Mineral Lit Mag:

Modern archaeology’s been around for 100 years, give or take.
When I die, my bones might be preserved for
 
the future to find. But let’s face it, my chances
are slim: The bodies on Everest will outlast mine.

Congrats to Carla Sameth who had three poems – “​LA Stories: Urban Mountain Lion, South African Transplant,” “Bruised Arms” and “Dreaming Sobriety” published at Anti-Heroin Chic. From “LA Stories: Urban Mountain Lion, South African Transplant”:

You didn’t want to come here. Los Angeles took you. Down to the basement, near Parker
Center and the Deja Vu Strip Club, next to the new marijuana mall. Where tourists take
photos and buy souvenirs while freshly tatted dazzling dispensary girls sell them strains
with names like “Flying Monkey” and “Ganja Goddess.”

From Stephanie Abraham‘s “In the World to Change It” at the Los Angeles Review of Books:

[LINDA SARSOUR’s] new book, We Are Not Here to Be Bystanders: A Memoir of Love and Resistance, maps her journey from growing up as an outspoken oldest child of immigrants to former executive director of the Arab American Association of New York and national co-chair of the Women’s March.

From Helena Lipstadt‘s “Speaking to the Dead; my mother didn’t whistle; Not Asking” at Cathexis Northwest Press:

Let me not be thief of your story   let me paint a still life 
of names you stand over me and below me I inhale the shimmer
of your breath I will not betray your blame

From Désirée Zamorano‘s “Death in the Neighborhood” at Terrain:

As I write I am sitting in my front yard patio, a tiny courtyard well-defined by a surrounding low stucco wall. The wall reminds me that I am good at boundaries, from years of struggling with an over-identifying, tiny and close-knit family of origin, from years spent “individuating,” as a young woman, carving out my private life, my secrets. In this shaded area I can hide under the camellia trees, watch people walk their dogs, listen to the chirruping of the birds, follow a pair of hummingbirds as they build their discreet nest, be both simultaneously public and private. It’s the same patio where my reclusive friend Liv, once and only once, shared a pitcher of Manhattans with me.

Also from Désirée, “Census 2020: A Quiz,” at Lady/Liberty/Lit:

Quizzes can be a way to get to know yourself better. Please self-identify to the best of your ability.

1. During apartheid in South Africa these would be your choices. Choose the one that best describes you:

a) White
b) Black
c) Coloured
d) Indian or Asian

From Noriko Nakada‘s “California” at The Nasiona:

Every second of the drive to California for summer vacation feels heavy, weighted down just like our car, packed tight with the six of us, suitcases stretching at their zippers, and the big cooler stuffed full of snacks. Dad drives the station wagon along cool mountain passes, past Lake Shasta, and into a desert valley where the sky is clear and the hot sun pounds through the windows. There is nothing to see except hills that look like blankets thrown over sleeping giants. I watch for something to change, but nothing has looked different for hours.

Also from Noriko, “How Do We Count Our Dead?” at bitter melon:

By breaths lost
loved ones left behind
accomplishments in life
shades of acquired fame?

Congrats to Noriko whose essays, “Vegas Indulgences” and “At Home in America” were published in Lady/Liberty/Lit and in Mom Egg Review!

From “A Relative Stole the Baby Name I Wanted to Use, but in the End I Was Thankful” by Rachael Rifkin at Good Housekeeping:

When my mom died a year and a half before I got pregnant, however, the names we’d chosen no longer seemed relevant. We knew if I eventually got pregnant, we’d name our child after my mom.

From Ryane Nicole Granados‘ “Peter Harris and Adenike Harris: This Father and Daughter Confronted Pain and Healed Together” at LA Parent:

They say it never rains in Southern California, but on a recent day clouds hovered over the hotel lobby where I sat in a corner booth sipping hot chocolate and eating breakfast sandwiches with Peter Harris and Adenike Harris, the father-daughter team behind Popsn’Ade, a project they started in 2016 to help others heal through creativity and call-and-response dialogue.

From Melissa Chadburn‘s “The Forgotten Babies” at Alta:

It was the summer of dead babies. At night I sat drowning in coroners’ reports and case files. Coyotes frolicked in the wash behind my house. Dry by summer, it held remnants of snow play—bright yellow and electric-blue plastic bits of toboggans. Brittle palo verdes littered with refuse from teenage parties, things like bottle caps and empty bags of chips. The hour of molting. The wildlings came in groups of three and four—clearing the mean ash-green pincushions and devil’s fingers in gleeful jumps. They danced, silhouetted against the black. Bats twisted above.

From Ashunda Norris‘ “On Watching Surviving R. Kelly” at Trampoline Poetry:

you understand nothing if you do not
have to imagine your own abuse replay
every time another blk girl opens her mouth
upturned & over complete

Congrats to Ashunda, who had two poems “Grandma’s Hands” and “The Book of Generation(s) of the Negress,” published in La Presa Issue 9!

Congrats to Rachel Sona Reed for her review of “Sociolinguistic variation in children’s language: Acquiring community norms” at Cambridge University Press!

Congratulations to Janel Pineda who had three poems, “English” “Rain” and “In Another Life,” published in The BreakBeat Poets Vol. 4: LatiNext published by Haymarket Books!

Check out Tanya Ko Hong‘s National Poetry Month 30 days project on Youtube!

We hope this roundup finds you and your loved ones healthy and safe! To ease the stress of these unsettling times, please enjoy this lengthy and exciting list of publications from Women Who Submit members. Congrats to all!

To begin, we’d like to invite you to check out Accolades: A Women Who Submit Anthology that includes writing from Women Who Submit members!

Congratulations to Aruni Wijesinghe, whose poem “Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick, Crème Color #640, Blackberry: Part I and Part II,” was published in Making Up: Poems!

From Anita Gill‘s “What We Can’t Do: A Father and Daughter’s List” at Citron Review:

On that trip, I would ask you for the millionth time why you never taught me your native tongue and your answer would be the same, “What use would it have been?”

Also from Anita, “Coronavirus Forced Me Home from Spain Where I Was a Fulbright Scholar,” at the Baltimore Sun:

On March 12th, I woke up in my apartment in Spain to discover the president of the United States had announced a ban of all travel between the U.S. and Europe on account of the ever-growing cases of coronavirus patients.

From Kate Maruyama‘s “Not Yet” at Barren Magazine:

This was my fault. I wasn’t paying attention when his arm went around my throat. I tried a back kick, an elbow to the ribs, I tried to turn to face him. But I couldn’t move. I visualized a knee strike to his head—but apparently all of those years watching my boy do karate and jujitsu didn’t pay off, because I blacked out.

Congratulations to Bonnie S. Kaplan who had a piece published in Closet Cases – Queers On What We Wear edited by Megan Volpert!

Congrats to Tanya Ko Hong who had three poems published in Cultural Weekly. From “Yang Kong Ju”:

Koreans called her
Yang kalbo
Yankee’s whore

Korean men say
No thanks—
even though it’s free

Check out this interview of Tanya and this book in which Tanya’s work is featured!

From “Parenting Through An Apocalypse” by Liz Harmer at The Walrus:

The day we got the keys to our new house in California, the so-called Holy Fire was blazing a few kilometres away. The sky rusted a kind of brownish orange, and on the piled boxes and half-dismantled furniture on the patio of our newly purchased home, ashes collected lightly, like dry snow. I had not been sleeping well and did not appreciate this omen.

Congrats to Helena Lipstadt who had her poem, “First Light June,” published in Undeniable: Alternating Current Press!

From Lituo Huang‘s “My Beautiful Sister” at VIDA:

My beautiful sister is eating a slice of watermelon. It tastes so good she shows me the whites of her eyes.

My slice is old. All the cells have gone dark.

My slice is old, I say.

Also from Lituo, “DO NOT CONTACT YOUR EX DURING THE PANDEMIC,” at Bitter Melon:

Do not call and ask him to hold your hand at the end of the world.
Do not email him to get your things back.
Do not drive by his house, slash his tires, slash your wrists.
Do not confess.

Also from Lituo, “My Small Press Writing Day,” at my (small press) writing day:

My writing day begins at 4:00 a.m., or sometimes 5:00 a.m., or 6:00 a.m., or 7:00 a.m., or 8:00 a.m., when I wake up with anxiety. The first writing I do is in a notebook where I write down when I went to bed. When I woke up. If and when I fell back asleep and woke up again. How tired I am.

From Angela M. Sanchez‘s “Bucking the Danger of a Single Story with the Power of a Multitude – A Review of Tales from La Vida: a Latinx Comics Anthology,” at solrad:

A single story, fortunately, is not what readers get in Tales from La Vida: A Latinx Comics Anthology. Edited by Dr. Frederick Luis Aldama, Distinguished Professor at The Ohio State University, Tales from La Vida offers a panorama of Latinx narratives, featuring seventy unique vignettes and over eighty contributors. With eye-catching artwork, some pieces harken to fotonovelas (Leighanna Hidalgo, Fernando Balderas Rodriguez) while others, like Zeke Peña’s fleshy heart pulsing with nopales, are stand-alone striking. 

Congratulations to Li Yun Alvarado whose poem, “Hechizo Para Congelar,” was published in Accolades: A Women Who Submit Anthology!

Happy Leap Year and congratulations to all the Women Who Submit who were published in February!

From Jenise Miller‘s “How Compton’s Communicative Arts Academy Rebuilt the City for Artists and Community Life” at KCET:

Before NWA, there was the CAA. Decades before young rap artists blasted a tough city image onto the world stage, a group of artists in Compton established the Communicative Arts Academy (CAA), a vital arts program in the era of the Black Arts Movement in Southern California in the 1960s and 70s. During the height of their operation from 1969 to 1975, the CAA invigorated Compton with art inspired by life and possibility in California’s first majority black city.

Congratulations to T.M. Semrad who had 2 pieces published at Nightingale & Sparrow – “A Wedding” and “Toward the Unfinished.” From “A Wedding:”

The groom sketches a self-portrait. He begins with the feet. They are practically shod. His feet ache. The shoes are black lace-ups with rubber soles. They are planted wide. He erases and begins again. He starts with the feet. He wears socks: nubby, cream, and thick. His feet get cold walking across the bare floor. He erases and begins again. He starts with the feet. They are bare, wide, the toes short. The big toes curl slightly up. He erases. He brushes the pale pink crumbs and pencil dust from the page, now smudged gray.

Check out T.M.‘s poem, “Virtual Realized,” published at Pomme!

Congratulations to Angelina Sáenz who had 2 poems published at Acentos Review – “Humidity” and “Estoy Sola.” From “Humidity:”

Humidity transports me

                  to musty brick homes along dusty roads
                  moist sunrise rooster calls
                  ragged dogs roaming on roofs

                  to Tepic, Nayarit

Neighbors in my Tia’s living room tiendita call

                  ¡Quiero! 

Also check out Angelina‘s, “I Come From a Place Where All We Knew Was to Be Ghetto Fabulous and Together,” at every other!

Have a listen to Lituo Huang‘s “Something to Remember” at Manawaker!

Congratulations to Donna Spruijt-Metz whose “Devil’s Fair,” a translation of Lucas Hirsch from the Dutch, was published at Copper Nickel!

Congratulations to Helena Lipstadt who had 3 poems published in February – “From Kalisz, Air, Earth” in The Midwest Quarterly, and “Doina in the Studyhouse” and “It Could Happen” in the Blue Mountain Review!

Congratulations to S. Pearl Sharp, who had a poem featured in the City of Los Angeles’ 2020 African Heritage Month Calendar and Cultural Guide!