Part One: Queer author Ryan La Sala and the queer horror story, The Dead of Summer

Part Two: A message from the evil spirit that lives inside Donald Trump

Part Three: A Sound Slice from a political rally in Richmond, Virginia. 

You can see a video version of this podcast over at https://www.youtube.com/@p2son

Ryan LaSala is a bestselling and award-winning queer author. He writes about surreal things happening to queer people. He is the author of BEHOLDER, REVERIE, and BE DAZZLED. Their debut horror novel, THE HONEYS, is in development to become a major motion picture. He joined me in the studio to talk about his most recent book, THE DEAD OF SUMMER. 

Cnidarians are a diverse phylum of over 11,000 aquatic, mostly marine, invertebrates—including jellyfish, corals, and sea anemones—characterized by radial symmetry, a simple gastrovascular cavity, and specialized stinging cells called nematocysts (cnidocytes). They possess a decentralized nerve net, lack true organs, and exist in two main body forms: sessile polyps and free-swimming medusae.

Music on today's show comes from EpidemicSound.com. Bubble and Squeak is produced by me, Peterson. I mostly make this show for myself, oh, and for Harlan, who listens, smiling while he walks. 

In this episode, the threads of community, justice, climate imagination, and art weave through three distinct yet deeply connected stories.

Today’s show comes in three parts:

What begins with a surprise email from my sister’s childhood classmate becomes a chain reaction of connection—stretching from a tiny town along the Delaware River to Zambia, Kenya, Hartford CT, and back to my cousin Mona over breakfast.

I speak with four remarkable women whose lives, work, and generosity intersect through period poverty, community organizing, youth empowerment, and a simple but world-changing tool: the menstrual cup.

⭐ Christine Garde Denning

⭐ Mary Maker (Mary Nyeriak)

⭐ Fran Stoffer (she/her)

⭐ Mona Norfleet

Climate dread meets unsettling beauty in Catherine Pierce’s celebrated poem Anthropocene Pastoral.

The poem first appeared in Poetry Magazine and later in her collection Danger Days.

Former Poet Laureate of Mississippi (2021–2025), author of Danger Days, with two new books coming in 2026:

Foxes for Everybody (memoir, Northwestern University Press)

Dear Beast (poetry, Saturnalia Books)

Find her work:

I travel to Abner Clay Park in Richmond’s historic Jackson Ward neighborhood for the “Axial Precession Procession,” part of Jump!Star, the ritual welcoming of Earth’s next North Star: Gamma Cephei (“Ceph”), due to rise in about 1,000 years.

The park is transformed with illuminated sculptures, movement choruses, and hundreds of volunteers known as “Dark Matter.”

This segment features a SoundSlice recorded live as time folds—past, present, and future converging for one luminous ritual.

Artist, director, collaborator, and visionary behind Jump!Star.

Mirah (NYC)

CouldYou? → https://couldyou.org

Website → www.yournccf.org/womenandgirls

Poems, books, events → https://catherinepiercepoet.com

Jump!Star info → https://www.georgeferrandi.com

Bubble & Squeak is written and produced by me, Peterson Toscano.

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