I have a confession to make: I’m sick of #MeToo. Whenever I see the hashtag, I feel dread. I lived through rape, abuse, and torture, so this is, in one sense, a personal reaction — reminders of familiar traumas make me hurt. That’s on me. No one else is responsible for my mental health. ButContinue reading “I’m a Rape Survivor With #MeToo Fatigue: Here’s Why”
Category Archives: Friends & Neighbours
In memory of Mikhail Ugarov
In the museum of our bones The keeper lights his nightly cigarette; His doctor says he must cut back And unlike us, he won’t mock fate. He leads a reverent life by day His mother’s bills are always paid His lawn and pubic hair are trim His children’s college funds undrained. His ex-wife can’t rememberContinue reading “In memory of Mikhail Ugarov”
I talked about abuse and made you uncomfortable? Good.
“People mistake vulnerability for intimacy. It’s not just annoying, it’s damaging.” — these words from my friend and Anti-Nihilist Institute co-founder Anna Lind-Guzik have been knocking around in my head lately for a reason. Vulnerability is a useful tool of connecting to one’s audience. This isn’t just true of confessional writing. When I began to openContinue reading “I talked about abuse and made you uncomfortable? Good.”
Writing round-up, 2016: Six non-horrible things that happened this year
I’m not really sure what to say about the year 2016. “At least we didn’t all die in a nuclear blast” is one good thing I could mention, I guess. On a personal level, it was a year of disappointments and setbacks, fears and frustrations, but also the year in which I sat in aContinue reading “Writing round-up, 2016: Six non-horrible things that happened this year”
NEW: poetry and essays archive
Dear friends, subscribers, and people who take offense at my Guns n’ Roses references, I wanted to point out that the new poetry and essays archive is now available on this site. It doesn’t contain all of my poetry and essays. Just the stuff that I like most. Yeah, yeah, it’s presumptuous to self-publish poetry.Continue reading “NEW: poetry and essays archive”
Natalia A. 