Some Gay Poems is back, officially! Thanks all who read and responded to my piece in Fruit Journal a couple weeks back. If you missed it, here’s a link:

Getting back to regular SGP programming now — I’ll be sending out these ~newsletters~ slightly less often, likely once every two weeks. I’ll also be featuring guest contributors as often as possible, so please do not hesitate to reach out (just reply to this email!) if you’d like to contribute a piece.

I’m so excited to have my first guest contribution this week — more on that later/below.

First up, my own poem this week, which owes its inspiration and format to Victoria Chang’s incredible collection Obit (and to my dear friend/poetry “colleague” Sasha Manoli for suggesting the prompt).

Obit

after Victoria Chang

Misha Solomon—died on August 16, 2021, under the sole of his own sandal. He thought he was killing the wasp that had just stung him under his middle toe. But he died with that wasp. As a child, he pet bumblebees as they gathered pollen, their legs becoming thick with flower dust. His parents encouraged him to rub one gentle finger along their fuzzy backs. Wasps are not fuzzy, but they are nonetheless important pollinators. We pet that which is inferior to us: a dog, a lover soon to be dismissed, an upset child. The wasp panicked, it was caught between foot and insole. Misha brushed the wasp out from under his foot, watched it seize upon the sidewalk, and then crushed it and himself before it could fly away. Maybe it wouldn’t have been able to fly away, the damage could already have been done. But it’s not a mercy if the motive is revenge. Metamorphosis is a kind of death, we lose ourselves when we lose our superiority. Misha died a panicked wasp.

SGP’s first guest contributor is Daniel Baylis.

Daniel Baylis is a writer, photographer, and adventurer. For the past decade, he has embarked upon unusual global expeditions that have included hiking across Israel/Palestine, cycling across India, and writing poetry in Cuba. His book, The Traveller: Notes from an Imperfect Journey Around the World, documents a yearlong quest to be helpful in twelve diverse corners of the world. Daniel's most recent project is a collection of poetry, entitled A Submission to Love.

Daniel and I met last week after having followed each other on Instagram for a little while. (Daniel and I are each fun to follow, you should try it!) It was wild to meet a new person in person (outdoors, natch) after so much pandemic time. I was so honoured that Daniel was interested in contributing a poem to this Substack — his collection is a beautiful joy to read (order it!), and my favourite piece is featured below (and in Daniel’s own voice in the recording that accompanies this ~issue~).

Thanks for reading and/or listening, y’all! See you in a couple weeks. And please reach out to submit/contribute/collaborate!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit somegaypoems.substack.com