We jump back in with Nakanee Monique and they kick us off with a reading of part 2 of her epic poem Listen. Take some time to read the full poem, included below.
Tacoma-based writer and activist Nakanee Monique (she/they) has been writing poetry since they were 8 years old and is “inspired by nature, science, literature, and all the great and terrible beauties of this world.” Find Nakanee’s poetry on their Instagram, @Lunarrhythm_6. Listen to Part 1 of our conversation with Nakanee here.
In this episode, Nakanee, Jamika, and Katy nerd out about the triumphs, struggles, methods, and tactics of writing. Nakanee is a four-time NaNoWriMo champion and entices us with the descriptions of their as-of-yet unpublished books! Nakanee also generously shares this link to their short story The Lore of the Blood Tree.
We talk through pandemic lessons learned, rediscovering ourselves, branding and monetizing creativity, and building strategies to survive and thrive as a working artist. Event planning also ensues including brainstorming about silent reading parties and write-ins.
Shout outs and topics include dragons, poetry, journaling, capitalism, commodification, hand-washing, TikTok, astrology, goals, boundaries, NaNoRiMo, worldbuilding, death, fantasy, imagination, naming, community building, write-ins, editing, vulnerability, trust-building, constructive criticism, Blue Cactus Press
(Featured photograph by Jamika!)
We want art tips! Email us at wearttacoma@gmail.com or hit us up on Twitter @wearttacomapod!
Listen
By Nakanee Monique
pt 1
Can you not hear
the past echoes
coming from our
throats, we’re choked
and we are suffocating
Still advocating for
ancient blasphemies
and trafficking
a tragedy
of souls by the soulless.
Made homeless,
then controlled us…
left alone in a sea
of apathy.
They sound like screams
like the roar of
collective dreams
unheard, on repeat
Always the frequencies
reverberate upon
frigid mountaintops
unmoved
like the screams are
merely a breeze
an afterthought;
an imperfect black spot
on the snow that
maddens though no
blot can stop
the avalanche your
hell hath wrought
for all your treasures
were paid and bought
with those screams
with those dreams
then hoarded
by dragons who
own the word ‘Free’.
Those worshiped
fiendish beasts have
pulled sheep’s wool
used cheap tools
to blind you.
But are you deafened too?
Learned no lessons through
songs and stories consumed
like cannibals…
Careful to whom
you refer as animals
For if you cannot hear it
the animal is you.
pt 2
Our cities glitter in the distance though
all that glitters is not gold, I know.
If they were gold, those cities—
no matter how pretty—
would be mined
to and fro, back and forth we’d go as we
excavate the ruins
of ourselves.
Mine and mine,
and yours and yours
would dig and dig
deep enough to build a
well intentioned
path to hell
One foot then the other
into the grave we go
Mistakes were made
as dragons taught us
that life itself
is a treasure,
but to a dragon a treasure
is made for taking
exploitation
made forsaken in homelands.
A dragon teaches us that
what’s mine is mine
and what’s yours is mine
so mine and mine and mine and mine
until gold turns to blood
and Earth turns to smoke—
and how are you not choking
on all of this?
Pollution industrial neglect
I can’t breathe enough to object
See how it all connects?
How short-sighted a dragon is?
‘Cause the paths that we built
will soon go both ways:
Hellish gate
Titans released
Dragons slumbering
True monsters await at the end of the path
and we are their final offering…
From up on high, despite
rising tides and the devastating truth of
Mother Nature’s might,
Dragons still choose human suffering
and to them
when the whole world’s on fire
it will be worth it
for the glittering recovery
&
when those fires of our desires
take us ever higher
reaching for their pinnacle—
the marketed “grind” lie—
the truth of what it means to be human
pigeonholed in the cynical
poison of our choosing
we must ask ourselves:
if here there be dragons and dragons have souls
how aren’t their souls the ones worth losing?
When they’re the ones refusing?
And we’re the ones bruising at the end of the day…
So, yes indeed
if here there be dragons isn’t it time that
we rise up and slay?
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