Kern Carter's Blog, page 76
November 17, 2021
November 16, 2021
Call For Submissions: What Have You Learned to Accept About Yourself?
Adobe Stock — Mary LongFor the latest series of Love & Literature, writer Alessia Petrolito reflects on her experience as a Black child growing up in Italy with her adopted parents. Her darker skin and afro full of coils were constant reminders of how different she looked from her friends and the people she loved. In the end, she finally reaches the point of accepting that she just might not belong.
In I’m Tired of Losing Sanity, she states:
Nìvura. I’m tired of losing sanity, escaping reality and myself. In these last five years, I felt like an expressionist painter. Every now and then, I’m enlightened and form theories that give me the right to be me: reasons and patterns that explain why I am who am I and why I feel what I feel.
So let’s talk about self acceptance. It can be something physical, a personal experience or perhaps one of your weaknesses. We’re wondering what have you learned to accept about yourself?
**Quick note: We ARE NOT accepting new writers at the moment. We’ll likely open up to new writers sometime in the new year.Same rules still apply:You can submit to this or ANY of our past writing prompts. Just scroll through our previous newsletters. They’ll be marked “Call for Submissions.”If you’re already a writer for CRY, go ahead and submit.Be as creative as you want in your submissions. As long as you stick to the topic, we’ll consider it.Just because you submit doesn’t mean we’ll post. If you haven’t heard back from us in three days, consider that a pass.Please reach out if you have any questions at all. If you are new to Medium, here’s how you submit a draft to a publication.
[image error]Call For Submissions: What Have You Learned to Accept About Yourself? was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
Why Write?
Photograph by Juliet AltmannMust you write? the wise ones always ask
So that novice writers know what to do next
That little question’s a part of the test
That a writer must pass to access the rest
The part when you know you’re a writer
You know you’re a scribe
You know you must listen
You know you must write
And once you’ve figured that out
You finally have time
To consider the questions
What should I write? — And why?
We can do it for self-inflation
We can do it to be heard
But shouldn’t there be some greater purpose for this written word?
If only some can write
And we find that we can
Then certainly we wield some power with these human hands
But what to do with that power?
We all eventually ask ourselves
We know we should tell stories, but what stories should we tell?
I know I am a writer
I know I am a scribe
I know I am to listen
I know I am to write
I know that I must do it
I know I must be heard
I know that there must be some reason for this written word
I think that I should share them
All these lessons I’ve learned
While looking for things to write about
The wonders I’ve observed
I think that I should write the truth
And listen to my heart
I don’t know where to go from here
But this is a good start
©2021 Juliet Altmann
[image error]Why Write? was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
November 15, 2021
The Voices In My Head Want Me To Disappear
Image by nuovolanevicataThe voices in my head are telling me I need change.
I need purpose.
I have an intense urge to disappear.
Travel afar and come back years later.
There aren’t any voices in my head.
There is one voice in my head.
According to my beliefs, having multiple voices may be having your own individual, the subconscious, and the voices of your environment from your childhood.
Although in my mind it all sounds like one voice.
I am a college student, part-time worker at a supermarket, interning as a copyeditor for my school’s english department, budding poet, beginner investor, beginner nail tech, and a writer.
The voice in my head tells me “I am doing too much.” So I listen.
I tell my family I need a break from school. Their response was I need to quit my job.
“School is the only option.” So I listen.
Three months into the semester the voice in my head is convincing me that I am happy.
I can do this.
With tears falling down my face and a chest full of molasses.
I am struggling to breathe.
The happiness the voice in my head convinced me was here is nowhere to be found.
“You are surviving. You can do this. You will get through this.”
Two days before my birthday. I am at work fighting back tears.
The voice in my head is telling me how much I hate my job.
“what is there to celebrate,” echoes in my mind.
I will graduate soon.
“You are broke. You are unhappy,” echoes as I scan a packet of yeast.
When I was 12, I planned to have a book published by this age.
A book, I have not yet begun.
The voice in my head is telling me that school is the problem.
It is three months into the semester. I am explaining to a friend I have not spoken to since the very beginning of this semester, how miserable I was for my birthday.
My friend says, “Damn, you’ve been down a long time”. He’s right.
It feels like everything around me is draining me. My internship, school, and my job. That is all that I give my time to aside from cleaning and cooking.
I am exhausted and my life does not feel fun.
Why should I celebrate a new year of life, when I have not been living. I have only been trapped in a spider web.
Flailing for my life. Trying to survive.
I need change. I need to begin to do all that is best for me.
This is the story of a broke college student.
Raw, sometimes passionless.
[image error]The Voices In My Head Want Me To Disappear was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
