How To Have A Body

grazie mille

I’m very touched, humbled, & excited about the attention the posts in this blog are getting lately. It is especially touching to hear that this work is resonating for other folks with disabilities & chronic illnesses, and that it is simultaneously striking chords for non-disabled people, too. I wasn’t expecting such a big (and positive) response to the work I’ve been posting, esp. because much of it still feels so drafty & in-process for me.

The support is heartening, and I am grateful. Thank you, all of you.

<3

1 Comments

“I know in my heart of hearts that creative drive and erotic drive are inextricably and undeniably linked. I can’t write if I can’t come. I can’t feel the peak of a story or a poem if I can’t feel the peak of my own orgasm. I don’t wanna write when I don’t wanna fuck, and I don’t wanna fuck when I don’t wanna write.”

— (via howtohaveabody)

This quote is one of the most overwhelmingly accurate things about myself that I’ve ever seen written by someone else.

(via gaspundkiss)

Oh, gaspundkiss, thank you. I’m so glad that this work resonates with you! I really love hearing what people get out of my work.
xxx,
Gina

(via gaspundkiss)

Source: howtohaveabody

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color me tumblr humbled.

queershoulder:

Wow. I noticed just now that this quote from the How To Have A Body blog has hit 50 notes, most of them reblogs & “hearts” from people I don’t know at all.

I’m a little amazed. I wrote it in a 2am fit of pique last winter, and the MFA workshop I took it to for critique had a lot of issues with/questions about it. I posted it this week wondering if anyone would notice it at all (especially on such a low-traffic blog).

Point being, I’m very touched that it is resonating with people. Thank you.

Grazie mille, you sweet people.

Source: queershoulder

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queershoulder:

Master of FIIIIIIIIIINE Arts!

So this happened yesterday. NBD.

Source: queershoulder

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“

I told myself that I didn’t expect much. It’s Pride. I am a good Pride hostess. Sometimes Pride hostessing means fucking a San Francisco visitor and a San Francisco newcomer at the same time, and not expecting anything other than an orgasm – if that – out of the deal. I told myself it wasn’t going to turn into anything serious with you.

I already knew that I was lying. It’s part of why I repeated my lines so diligently. Even if just in my own head.

”

1 Comments

“I know in my heart of hearts that creative drive and erotic drive are inextricably and undeniably linked. I can’t write if I can’t come. I can’t feel the peak of a story or a poem if I can’t feel the peak of my own orgasm. I don’t wanna write when I don’t wanna fuck, and I don’t wanna fuck when I don’t wanna write.”

8 Comments

“You’ve said that I can’t hold you any more, so I hold onto your words like they mean something. The one thing I know to be true about you is how genuine you are. You just don’t say things you don’t mean. Do you?”

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“I missed a lot about _____, those first few months after the split. His crooked smile & infectious laugh & god-awful jokes, how he tasted like salt & bay leaves or chocolate & whiskey, his cornflower blue eyes & the smattering of freckles across his face, his rotating collection of hats & suspenders. He fucked like an angel sent down from Heaven with a map of my body, he brought me hot pink star-gazer lilies at every opportunity just to watch me grin about it. But the thing I missed the most, the ache that ruined me for months, the loss I just couldn’t stop grieving, was having a sweetheart who so deeply got the broke & broken & sick & scared parts of me, was having a sweetheart who I could be all of those things with – broke & broken & sick & scared – and to not have to hide, or lie, or put on a Brave Face, or worry that there just wouldn’t be room for it, so why even bring it up in the first place? The thing we did best, above all else, was be family to each other. The thing we did best was hold each other up to the light.”

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“

As I get older, as time goes by, I care less and less and less about whether someone can talk pretty. I care about action. At the end of the day, I don’t care how well you can articulate your perfectly punctuated anti-oppressive political points, I don’t care how many buzzwords fall from your mouth, I don’t care if you name-drop a thousand acronyms or theorists – I care if you will show up. I care if you will fucking show up.

And I know that showing up is complicated when you struggle with whether or not you can get outta bed. Sometimes showing up means biking to a friend’s house with coconut water & ginger ale & Saltines when she has stomach flu. Sometimes it means sharing your leftover pain meds from your emergency root canal when a friend has a pain spike. Sometimes it means making soup in a friend’s kitchen, stocking his fridge & freezer, blowing him a kiss across his bedroom & miming tucking him up under his sheets, because you can’t actually tuck him in or kiss him good-bye, because your own immune system is fragile enough as it is. And sometimes it means texting a little emoticon heart from your own sick bed, where you are laid up with a shoulder that aches so bad when the weather gets damp (which is a lot in San Francisco), or a stomach that can’t digest a fucking thing, or clogged-up sinuses, or a throat on fire, or a wet raspy cough. Sometimes it just means saying Honey, I love you. Honey, my sick heart reaches out to your sick heart. Honey, I wish I could be there, and I can’t, but I can do this. You mean the world to me. Sister. Brother. Love.

”

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Last Hurrah at SF State on Thursday! :)

queershoulder:

SF State Comrades (and any friends & fans who might wanna trek out to SFSU to see me):

I will be reading from “How To Have A Body” (aka my Thesis) at the SFSU MFA/MA Thesis Reading on Thursday.

Party time! Come out & see me do my last hurrah at State!

This is today at 5pm!

Source: queershoulder

3 Comments