0. Self-insert as narrator:
[ i cannot look you
in the eye / tell the story
without telling it ]i am in flight again: [ ] is a name unspoken:
i am creating a home without boxes: [ ] is an extended phase:
i am rehearsing a memory: [ ] is a re-run
repeating: i am quietly imploding:cascade of stars. awakening.[ i am something other
than what i th/ought ]the irony comes after a premature wedding / everything created is bound by its context /
that is, space and time / so i will forgive myself later / for now, the next iteration:1. Self-insert as a story:
Star Trek Voyager is an odyssey – an impossible
& endless homecoming. i start to believe
in impossible feats like survival:in the face of destruction & death
the starship rebuilds itself again.
the crew renews its memory each episode,
no trace of the last trauma[ i will remember this later,
post- the edge of my known world
when i excise the boy from my poetry ]2. Self-insert as Chief Engineer:
Lieutenant B’Elanna Torres is a mirror:
angry / lost / confused / conflicted / alonehalf-Klingon & half-human, B’Elanna
cleaves & falls into herself, a shattered identity[ relate / recognise / reflect / become ]3. Self-insert as space:
grow obsessed with a gravity i can’t escape / a black-hole anomaly / can’t get enough / don’t realise
i’ve fallen in love with a fictional character / all that misplaced longing projected into nightly viewings:she sees my pent-up longing, all that stifled ache /
i am begging to be seen / i am guilty for wanting itwhat it comes to:
fanfiction is a necessary salve
– i falsify into re-tellings:#StarTrekVoyager #f/f #Torres/Janeway #Kathryn/B’Elanna
#angst #femslash #lesbians #slow burnin the blue-lit dark i learn / what i had never known of desire.
4. Self-insert as Captain Janeway:
nothing is simple about confronting fear
when flung into a distant quadrant. which is to say
at first
i looked awayfrom [ memory / mirror / mouth / monster ]
or: the answer i seek5. Self-insert as alien lifeform:
i sleep next to the boy
not with him.my alien body
my alien longing.6. Self-insert as audience:follow the fanfic to its logical conclusion:
the captain and chief engineer’s lusty affair,
a hook-up in the Jeffries tubes.
learn how to pleasure another woman
in some far-off impossible
futurea fiction twice, three times removed.
[ the strangeness of a future where
interspecies relationships are widely accepted,
but two women never fall in love. ]7. Self-insert as a starship:
my body a ship dead in the water.
my body a wreckage in the deep –number seven searching seasons before i return
to myself / ruptured. reborn. rebuilding.
- 115: SPACE
with A Sometimes
114: NO THEME 13
with J Toledo & C Tse
113: INVISIBLE WALLS
with A Walker & D Disney
112: TREAT
with T Dearborn
111: BABY
with S Deo & L Ferney
110: POP!
with Z Frost & B Jessen
109: NO THEME 12
with C Maling & N Rhook
108: DEDICATION
with L Patterson & L Garcia-Dolnik
107: LIMINAL
with B Li
106: OPEN
with C Lowe & J Langdon
105: NO THEME 11
with E Grills & E Stewart
104: KIN
with E Shiosaki
103: AMBLE
with E Gomez and S Gory
102: GAME
with R Green and J Maxwell
101: NO THEME 10
with J Kinsella and J Leanne
100: BROWNFACE
with W S Dunn
99: SINGAPORE
with J Ip and A Pang
97 & 98: PROPAGANDA
with M Breeze and S Groth
96: NO THEME IX
with M Gill and J Thayil
95: EARTH
with M Takolander
94: BAYT
with Z Hashem Beck
93: PEACH
with L Van, G Mouratidis, L Toong
92: NO THEME VIII
with C Gaskin
91: MONSTER
with N Curnow
90: AFRICAN DIASPORA
with S Umar
89: DOMESTIC
with N Harkin
88: TRANSQUEER
with S Barnes and Q Eades
87: DIFFICULT
with O Schwartz & H Isemonger
86: NO THEME VII
with L Gorton
85: PHILIPPINES
with Mookie L and S Lua
84: SUBURBIA
with L Brown and N O'Reilly
83: MATHEMATICS
with F Hile
82: LAND
with J Stuart and J Gibian
81: NEW CARIBBEAN
with V Lucien
80: NO THEME VI
with J Beveridge
57.1: EKPHRASTIC
with C Atherton and P Hetherington
57: CONFESSION
with K Glastonbury
56: EXPLODE
with D Disney
55.1: DALIT / INDIGENOUS
with M Chakraborty and K MacCarter
55: FUTURE MACHINES
with Bella Li
54: NO THEME V
with F Wright and O Sakr
53.0: THE END
with P Brown
52.0: TOIL
with C Jenkins
51.1: UMAMI
with L Davies and Lifted Brow
51.0: TRANSTASMAN
with B Cassidy
50.0: NO THEME IV
with J Tranter
49.1: A BRITISH / IRISH
with M Hall and S Seita
49.0: OBSOLETE
with T Ryan
48.1: CANADA
with K MacCarter and S Rhodes
48.0: CONSTRAINT
with C Wakeling
47.0: COLLABORATION
with L Armand and H Lambert
46.1: MELBOURNE
with M Farrell
46.0: NO THEME III
with F Plunkett
45.0: SILENCE
with J Owen
44.0: GONDWANALAND
with D Motion
43.1: PUMPKIN
with K MacCarter
43.0: MASQUE
with A Vickery
42.0: NO THEME II
with G Ryan
41.1: RATBAGGERY
with D Hose
41.0: TRANSPACIFIC
with J Rowe and M Nardone
40.1: INDONESIA
with K MacCarter
40.0: INTERLOCUTOR
with L Hart
39.1: GIBBERBIRD
with S Gory
39.0: JACKPOT!
with S Wagan Watson
38.0: SYDNEY
with A Lorange
37.1: NEBRASKA
with S Whalen
37.0: NO THEME!
with A Wearne
36.0: ELECTRONICA
with J Jones