The Seasons, a new digital chapbook
forthcoming from UK's Full House Literary
I am pleased to announce the forthcoming publication of “The Seasons, an excerpt from Welcome to Upper Zygonia” as a digital chapbook to be published by UK’s Full House Literary. Heartfelt thanks to JP Seabright, editor of the chapbook and arranger of promotional stuff, and the team at Full House Literary for publishing and supporting my work.
The launch date is February 29, 2024 and there will be a reading with special guests on March 3, 2024. Price and ordering details to follow. In the meantime, check out the lovely blurbs about the chapbook.
Welcome to Upper Zygonia is a series of long poems about an imaginary Utopia, a new home for beings exiled from their home planets due to climate and social justice apocalypse.
With thanks to the City of Ottawa and the Ottawa Arts Council for funding the manuscript, the League of Canadian Poets and the Writers Union of Canada for funding video-readings from the manuscript. Thanks also to rob mclennan of above/ground press, who published another excerpt from WTUZ, The Before. And Dan Power of TrickHouse Press, who published an excerpt from “The Dream Beings of Upper Zygonia” in the 2022 Annual. Twenty Wild Blue Birds of Upper Zygonia were published in Nicola Winborn’s mail zine, Attic Zine: International House of Colour.
Here is a video reading from The Before, sponsored by the Writers Union of Canada.
Here is a video reading of another excerpt, sponsored by the League of Canadian Poets.
BACKGROUND
Welcome to Upper Zyognia is a collection of poems based on an imaginary Utopia I created when I needed to escape from reality. It is part of the Zygonian galaxy with other planets such as Greater and Lesser and Lower Zygonia. Upper Zygonia has been a refuge during times of pain, while waiting for surgeries, medical appointments, and other circumstances out of my control.
In 2020, there seems to have been a renaissance in both the writing and reading of speculative poetry and fiction. As a distraction from the pandemic, I began to draw the world of Upper Zygonia and to share these drawings on social media. I found myself discussing the world and wanting to write about it.
The speculative literature arena has always been a home for those who don’t fit into the mainstream. This work will be written for fellow kindred misfits. It deals with concerns of pain, trauma, tragedy and grief by approaching them sideways. Sachiko Murakami said on a recent episode of the Small Machine Talks, a podcast I hosted through AngelHousePress, that she tells poetry workshop students when they are having trouble tackling a difficult subject directly to approach it through another means. In my case, an imaginary world.
The work is queer and feminist with ideals of social justice, equality and care. My aim was to create an empathetic refuge for those who do not fit in, a work where we recognize each other and find comfort.
Welcome to Upper Zygonia uses a variety of techniques that interrogate traditional narrative and other structures of dominant cultures. It will address the idea of the uncertain body.
The work was inspired by utopias. During this pandemic I have spent a lot of time thinking about what a world free of poverty, hunger, war, economic and social disparities would look like. We are witnessing the effects of injustices caused by long term structural systems of capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy. In my anxiety, I began creating a refuge for those who have been harmed by these systems.
The work features Sparrow who flies to those in need of relief from pain; Silver, who was burned badly in a fire and lost parents and siblings; Lilac, a playful genius who is a nonbinary character, Willomena, the willow tree; the Leaflings, who were humans who turn into trees when they die; the Flowers: Ivy, Orange Blossom and Violet, who are burlesque dancers, Saint Asemica of the Holy Order of Whimsy, Mt. Glyph, the River of Codes, the Library of Whimsy, Little Green, one of the many multi-coloured cats who roam around Upper Zygonia, airships, hot air ballons, flowerfish, catterflies, and other whimsical characters, places and spaces, events.
Welcome to Upper Zygonia addresses the difficulty of language articulation through the use of metaphors relating to language, through companion drawings which include asemic writing: mark making in the form of invented alphabetics and symbols.
This was an exceptionally entertaining project. Whimsy, exploration and connection with kindreds are always my main goals when creating a project. If anyone wants to publish a 150-page full colour hybrid work of poetry, visual poetry, and asemic writing, let me know.