essays by shé

bookshelf

Tag: poetry

  • Underwater Realm

    Not only is gravity suspended under water, time seems to be as well. Hoi polloi noises are muffled, and I float through flocks of small fish. Little forests of seaweed waft in the longshore current, and mosaic’d swimmers dart suddenly away when they realize they’ve been spotted. Stingrays leave round depressions in the seabed, and…

  • 2Loved2BUgly

    So, I shaved my head. I look like Steve McQueen. Or a monk. Not a curl in sight. It’s very soft, though, and quite comforting to pet. But Scorn visited quickly. “You are too ugly to be loved,” she said. Fortunately my inner Pollyanna piped up. “No, babe. You are too loved to be ugly,” which made…

  • Poetry Prompter

    An assortment of job titles over the years: mussel farmer, ghostwriter, roving flower seller, guerrilla-art-instigator, body double, phone book deliverer, pâté promoter, attendance goddess, canine physical therapist, living sculpture, Ferrari driver, Instant Poetry Booth operator, Literary Lounge host, neighborhood association president.  But my favorite title by far is Poetry Prompter. Hired by the Washington State…

  • Heard

    Anxiety is finally taking a back seat. Feels like years that she’s been driving me around. But now I have a home — Habibi of the Sea. And time and space to write. A publisher contacted me recently. She’s interested in Letters to Lulu, the epistolary novella I penned in 2013, the same year I evacuated…