Francesca Forrest's Blog, page 10

"The Placeholder," by Patricia Russo

Patricia Russo writes weird, wonderful things, full of heart. "The Placeholder" is a flash piece about planting a stray seed.

I love it on its own merits, and what it's saying isn't the same as what "Semper Vivens" is saying, but there are some harmonies:

What his heart wanted was to lick the leaf that was touching his lip and then bite it, chew it slowly, taste it thoroughly, swallow it, and then the next one on the stem, and the next. Even if they tasted bad. Even if they made him sick. Even if ...

Do you like puppies? Motorcycle jackets? Shapeshifting jasmine?

Goodness, I didn't post at all last week ...

Well, today I bring you three things. Let's lead with puppies...

(  puppies  )

(  motorcycle jackets  )

Popcorn Jasmine

I have a jasmine plant which gets to live outside during warm months. It gives me great joy to go admire its flowers and breathe in their scent... and sometimes pick them for tea. I have the shape of their petals memorized.

This past Saturday, we stopped at a highway rest stop on our way home from visiting my dad, and in the parking lot by one...

a cascade of scratch cards

I haven't been into the nearby convenience store in what feels like years. It felt very different inside, though it's the same space and selling the same stuff, so it's not *that* different. But the scratch cards behind the counter were displayed differently--they were in a waterfall, just pouring down from the back wall. Part of this impression may have been because they were mainly of just two or three types (?) and those were colored in greens and blues (?) Seems like when I go to the custome...

Wednesday reading two weeks running!

I finished Rebecca Fraimow's Lady Eve's Last Con, which was rollicking good fun from cover to cover. A couple more quotes (nonspoilery) from further on in the story:

"I’d given her plenty of time to put me back in my place; she’d be faster on the draw next time around. It’s a bad habit to let yourself get caught tongue-tied. Life’s too short for should-have-saids." (51% in)

"I stuck my chin up, and tried to look like a person who was trying to look brave." (91% in)

I got one hilarious surprise, whi...

catbird and red currants

I love catbirds. They are so friendly! They come very near to people and just start chatting. When I hang up laundry, when I go out on my porch, when I'm looking at my plants, along comes a catbird.

The catbirds also like to eat my red currants. The season is pretty much over now, but I drew a chalk drawing in the 90+ degree heat to commemorate catbirds and red currants. I had it on good authority from the weather people that it wasn't going to rain until tomorrow at the earliest, which meant th...

taking turns

On the first day we spent together, my friend took me down to the edge of Yahuarcaca. That name goes with a group of lakes connected to the Amazon, los lagos Yahuarcaca, but she calls it/them río--Río Yahuarcaca. Like the main river, it inhales and exhales. The waters are at their highest in April or so, and then begin to recede. In June (when I was there this time) they're not at their lowest, but they've receded a good bit. So as you walk beside the water, you're walking in places where you'd ...

Who can be on campus? An agouti, for one

I spent two days together with my friend and Tikuna tutor this past June. I'm going to post about those days in reverse order.

On the second day, we rented bikes and rode past the airport (the airport in Leticia is adorably small and you can walk from it into town if you want) to the Leticia campus of the National University of Colombia. Wakanomori and I had tried to do that when we were there together two years ago, but the former president of the country had been speaking there and no one was ...

Wednesday Reading

I have so many saved up for this! And I'm actually writing on a Wednesday. Wohoo, win condition!

What I've just finished

A Family of Dreamers, by Samantha Nock. radiantfracture put me onto this collection by quoting one of the poems. Samantha Nock is an indigenous poet, and her poems reflect that heritage, but also explore family relations, love, self doubt--you know: the stuff we write poetry about.

(  Some quotes  )

* * *

Ideias Para Adiar O Fim Do Mundo, by Ailton Krenak
This has also been translated...

Cho-co-la-te

I love hand-clapping games; they're such a wonderful example of truly folk transmission through the generations.

While I was visiting my friends in Leticia, two of the kids were doing one. The rhyme went

Choco, choco
la, la,
choco, choco
te, te,
choco-la
choco-te
chocolate!

You clapped sometimes with the palms of your hands and sometimes with the backs of your hands--it was great!

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When I got back to Medellín, at one point Wakanomori and I passed a line of people waiting for pancakes at a pop-up pancake...

Semper Vivens: Published!

I am back from my holiday, and will have many things to share, but while I was gone, my Amazon/Annihilation story "Semper Vivens" slipped into the world, so that's what I'm going to talk about first.

It's in Andromeda Spaceways Magazine issue 95, and behold, the cover is an illustration for it!

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A terraforming disaster, tragic cultists, and frustrated researchers collide...

Twenty-five years ago, catastrophic failure in a seeder ship’s systems had resulted in its entire cargo of LifeMatrix being d...