Neil Gaiman

This is Roz Kaveney. We’ve been friends since 1985, and I can attest that she’s been on the right side of history. I learned so much from her:

You should read this article. (And if you do, post your favourite quote or thing you learned from it…)

neil-gaiman:

Two poems by Roz Kaveney:

No matter what. My people will endure.

Kill us. Imprison us. Carve up our brain.

Out of your children we are born again.

Erase our past and future but be sure

We are among you añd will find a way

To know ourselves in fragments from the past

Constructed truths. You think you have locked fast

The doors of memory. Your world is gray

Lacks savour. We umami of the soul

Palate remembers taste it never knew

Your angry grand children will stare at you

Carve us from world and you will leave a hole

Negative space describes all that we were

They fill it with new flesh. He him. She her.

#

When they have killed us all, or maybe most

Of us, because some fragment will escape.

We are quite good at hiding. When they rape

Some young guy on your street and later boast

Taught it to be a woman, when they shave

That blonde’s head bloody slash her by mistake

Across the cheek for being tall. And make

Pyre of our books. And in an unmarked grave

Neighbour or niece. Legitimate concern?

Will you still sleep at night? Will you forget

You sort of wanted this…perhaps not yet…

But soon you’ll stand and cheer and watch us burn.

Then later say it was not in your name

You never meant it and are not to blame.

(Twitter links follow.)

ALT

ALT

RTing because, when I was cutting and pasting before, the first line of the first poem became the last line. Now corrected and easier to read and navigate, I hope.

And here’s a link to Roz’s Selected Poems 2009-2021.

and here’s a great article about her prose:

Two poems by Roz Kaveney:

No matter what. My people will endure.

Kill us. Imprison us. Carve up our brain.

Out of your children we are born again.

Erase our past and future but be sure

We are among you añd will find a way

To know ourselves in fragments from the past

Constructed truths. You think you have locked fast

The doors of memory. Your world is gray

Lacks savour. We umami of the soul

Palate remembers taste it never knew

Your angry grand children will stare at you

Carve us from world and you will leave a hole

Negative space describes all that we were

They fill it with new flesh. He him. She her.

#

When they have killed us all, or maybe most

Of us, because some fragment will escape.

We are quite good at hiding. When they rape

Some young guy on your street and later boast

Taught it to be a woman, when they shave

That blonde’s head bloody slash her by mistake

Across the cheek for being tall. And make

Pyre of our books. And in an unmarked grave

Neighbour or niece. Legitimate concern?

Will you still sleep at night? Will you forget

You sort of wanted this…perhaps not yet…

But soon you’ll stand and cheer and watch us burn.

Then later say it was not in your name

You never meant it and are not to blame.

(Twitter links follow.)

ALT

ALT