Tiny resistances for online folks

hang out with me IRL in Chicago this August?

A return to the tangible.

That is what I wrote in my diary three months ago when I started feeling an almost arthritic (digital?) despair seep into my fingers. Beyond anything, I was, and still am, craving real things.

After chronically being online for the last three years, I can feel the effects of it. So I’m doing the thing that artists have done for so many years. (Really, it’s humorous how unoriginal this is.) But in a way, it’s also comforting. It’s so unoriginal to need rest, to turn inwards, to pause, because well….we all need to at some point.

Here’s how I’ve been tangoing with the tangible the last few months.

Tiny, yet tangible, resistances for online folks

1. These days, I’m ripping my herbs instead of chopping them. Gardening without gloves and a shovel. I want my hands to remember their vigour. I want my thumbs to pull open the very earth they came from. Press into the world’s chest and feel it tremble. Rewire the subconscious desire to scroll.

2. I’m listening to the radio in the car. Sitting through commercials. Allowing discomfort to rise in me and then welcoming it as a guest in the home of my bones.

3. I’m reading physical poetry books instead of online poetry. My latest favourite collection is

   Erica Miriam Fabri
   ‘s “Morphology” out with Write Bloody Publishing this year. In her poem “The Greatest Poem Ever Written” she says

   “There must be a tongue in this poem, with its own animal heart, and two lips that suck skin like warm dumplings.”

   Are you kidding me? Perfection. Grab her collection here. Best read with a salted iced americano in the sun, imo.

4. I’m gathering with my (truly amazing) online poetry community in person. (Gather is currently paused for the summer and will resume in the fall with our next 12-week round.) In the meantime, we’re hanging out IRL. Yep, after a year and a half of Zooms, it’s fricken’ happening.

   20 of us are flying out to Chicago and putting on a Poetry Show for the public (that’s you!) It’s going to be the most damn spectacular poetry event you’ve been to.

   Come hang out with me and 19 other incredibly talented poets on August 9th at 6:30 pm. RSVP here.

   

   Meet your favourite poets:

   Maria Giesbrecht
   ,
   Isabelle Correa
   , Kelly Green, Jules DuMais,
   James Morehead
   ,
   Annalise Parady
   ,
   Alina Kalontarov
   Bri Gearhart Staton, Kassandra Vilchis, Lauren Richkus, Richard Cavazos, Kiran Josen,
   Allison Mei-Li
   , Megan Oosthuizen, Claudia Jean, Angelina Aldrich, Melia Stern, Indira Devos, Kelsy Bellah, and Chris Meinke.

   

I hope we can tangibly and giddily enjoy each other’s company this summer, truly.

Love,

Maria

---

P.S. Our Gather writing table has paused for the summer. We’re frolicking in the woods, ripping open tomatoes with our fingers, and all around just taking some time to rest. We’ll begin writing again on September 1st. If you’d like to join us, you’re welcome to add your name to the waitlist here.