Part 2 with Writer Nakanee Monique: Worldbuilding and Finding Community

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...

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 Nakanee is a four-time NaNoWriMo champion and entices us with the descriptions of their as-of-yet unpublished books!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 [email protected] 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?