With the whole pandemic going on, this year’s Burning Eye Books releases are staggered. A lot of release parties postponed, cancelled or moved to online (again, gotta love an online event).
So, it looks like Meanwhile will be released in October instead of September. Will add more updates as time goes by, including book release party, tour, or whatever comes next. Smoke signal book tour? Message pigeon delivery service? We’ll see how this match of Civ VI our society is stuck in continues.
Take lots of care. Stay safe, wherever you are. Love you.
One of the things I miss from the outside world is spoken word open mic nights. Fortunately, some of my fave nights in Leicester have found a way for us to keep talking, keep listening and keep connecting from quarantine and self-isolation.
Jess Green’s Find the Right Words is now available as a poetry podcast with the usual features of their evenings Upstairs at the Western: speed poet, headline acts, open mic and the raffle. You can access it for $5 USD per month on Patreon. Cheaper than a ticket at the pub. Gutted I couldn’t see Maria Ferguson and Dan Simpson in person this month (as well as whole lovely FTRW tribe), but at least we can hear them.
WORD! hosted by Lydia Towsey, is doing this daily thing on social media called “Poetry to Wash Your Hands to”, where some of us shared a snippet of our work in 20 seconds, the recommended time you should spend washing your hands to get clean and prevent illnesses. This is my video, an adaptation of my NaPoWriMo poem “Taking Back Sunday”, called “Taking Back the Quarantine”.
You can hot desk on your laptop from your kitchen or your living room. Don’t be ashamed if your job or vocation’s a labour of love. Look at art. Make some art. Read some books. Write some lines. Listen to some new music. Make even newer sounds. Lying down on your bed, know that the quarantine is yours and that you’ve done your best. Have some rest.
Cynthia Rodríguez – Taking Back the Quarantine
A lot of the time I’ve been feeling useless as someone at risk who can’t just go outside and help, so this is kind of a self-reminder in a way.
Next week, you can still perform for Some Antics, regularly hosted by Sammy Nour at Bean Gaming Cafe. Their 15th episode will be released online, headlined by Jemima Hughes, on the weekend of the 3rd of April. If you fancy being on the open mic or exercise your competitive bone at the slam, send Sammy your video by Wednesday 1st April. Donations are more than welcome, to keep Bean Gaming afloat waiting for us in all our nerdom once this mess is all over.
Finally, in the not-so-distant future, Soulful Group are holding their Soulful Sunday relaxed-fit gathering online on 13th April, 3pm. If you want the link to join, email Shobana: hello@soulfulgroup.com
If you’re from Leicester (or the rest of the world because THE INTERNET) and you are holding open mic and poetry events online, let us know.
CW: COVID-19, health risk, self-isolation, quarantine
These times are scary and uncertain. People are ill and dying due to selfishness and inconsideration from the government and the general public. It was not until this week that universities and other institutions shifted their services from presential to online, while pubs and leisure centres were only closed last night – after a bunch of glazed hams packed their locals for a few cheeky pints goodbye.
As a person at high risk due to my chronic conditions, I have been self-isolating at home for about ten days now. It looks like I will spend the remainder of March indoors. We had to cancel our visit to relatives in Mexico (where there are fewer cases and quicker security measures) for Spring Break, as well as a university trip to Amsterdam and Brussels later in April. University is now providing online-only lectures. I had an informal one yesterday, catching up with coursemates and lecturer (who has the main symptoms of COVID-19 and is recovering at home). It was wholesome. I also joined a Zoom meeting from the Labour party with a lot of grassroots discussion featuring Jeremy Corbyn. The other day, I spoke on the phone to a friend; and I’ve been regularly in touch with family.
You can’t give from an empty cup. Particularly useful advice from Moon and Bear these days.
It’s quite odd, but in this state of isolation, I feel a lot more involved with the issues and people I love and care about than in “normal circumstances” aka semi-automated austerity heteropatriarchal underworld capitalism. Been saving a lot of spoons that I used to spend on preparation and commuting. No pressure to trek it into places that take time and money to reach. No longer having to put on a glam face, pretending things are fine, chasing arbitrary targets of success. We all just sit down, unkempt, in front of the webcam, and talk to each other in solidarity, sharing ideas much easier with the help of technology. Gaining access to free books, intimate gig streams, words of advice, movie-watching and gaming.
The possibilities have always been there. We could have taken them before all of this happened. But now that we have them and we know how to use them, we must not let them go.
Picture of myself on the screen waiting for a Microsoft Teams meeting. Home office.
Once/if/when we are back to normal, let’s make our events as accessible as possible. Affordable and comfortable in person and online. Reach out as many as possible. The chronically disabled, to whom the curfew never ends. Those kept apart from us by geography, economy, architecture, medicine, law. Make our practices available and sustainable, for our customers/audiences and ourselves. Don’t be afraid to say yes. Don’t be afraid to say no. Don’t be afraid. Be prepared.
