laura lethe

[lauralethe]

From last year’s napowrimo.

[lauralethe]

I would probably get you one of those jade stones from the store on the side of the road, where the waves crash in between the sounds of knives getting through stacks of pancakes at the cafe nearby. It’s your birthday soon after all. I would pick a postcard with rocks or seals to go with it, trading money for memories that mean everything to me in that moment. Because they would be for you. I’m sure you’d have asked to receive my weekly emails, and you’d never answer, except once, saying sorry for being silent, everything is moving fast and i’ve been kissing boys and painting galaxies on my body and changing plans every two days. How weird is it that we didn’t get to know each other as grown ups, like proper grown ups, lost and running around but owning up to it, instead of being fearful and looking the other way half the time. What a shame that it took me too long to become someone capable of saying, I’m sorry for being a coward. . A month ago, looking out the window of the bus taking me further south, Puff Daddy’s Police cover playing in the background, I wrote you a letter on my phone, my chubby fingers scattering typos all over the words I’ll always be ashamed to share. The sky was grey and the landscape breathtaking. I didn’t buy you a greenstone. Today, you would have turned 29. (à Tauranga, New Zealand)

[lauralethe]

This is what you learn from jumping. Trust the process. Embrace the chaos. Most things will die anyway. Waiting for the dust to settle means waiting for ever. Leave nothing behind but people. Surrender. Peel your skin, wear it inside out. Wreck all expectations. Make a mess. Take no shit. Hold your own hand. Say you’re wrong. Don’t go back. Push through until it hurts the most; then you’ll be free. This is what you learn from jumping. Comfort is an illusion and safety will never let you go. May we never be still again. (à New Zealand)

[lauralethe]

The most frustrating thing about preparing a move to New Zealand is all that hippie love-fest vibe. I might be an adorable baby that's all about caring and mind-opening experiences and stuff, but if I find one more blog post praising living in a youth hostel dorm for six months or jumping into a van with strangers on a whim, "following your instincts" and "forgetting everything you know", I'm burning all my stuff to find a hole in the woods.

I have high functioning anxiety, underlying depression, I'm neurodivergent, and oh, I'm a friggin woman on her own, who cannot just be surfin' the vibe ya know. Trust is not a common word on my tongue. 

So, I still have no idea what this part of the world will hold for me. I might just write a detailed guide on how to survive the land of the young carefree backpacker when you're a high maintenance kitten who hates everyone.

[lauralethe]

National Poetry Writing Month is over. I wrote one poem a day, and almost each time, it was a few minutes before falling asleep, struggling to push back bedtime so I could get a few sentences out of me.

Looking back, I haven't written anything I really like, but I've also realized not everyone can make practise perfect when practise is basically stirring up your guts while pretending you don't have a 20 hours sleep debt.

This one is from last October and I didn't fight to get it out. Not everything has to hurt; even when it takes root into sadness.

[lauralethe]

L’association Polyvalence cherche des témoignages  - anonymes ou pas - autour des sujets cités ci-dessus, dans le but d’éditer des fanzines thématiques.

Elle recherche aussi des gens motivé-e-s pour illustrer bénévolement les textes sélectionnés.

Polyvalence est une très chouette asso, active sur moult fronts ; si ça vous dit d’apporter votre pierre ou un petit bout de vous-même, c’est ici et ça sera plus qu’apprécié.

Un grand merci d’avance :-*

[lauralethe]

Breaking my own rules and buying copyright-stealing fast fashion cause apparently i can't resist a super cheap Moomins tee-shirt

[lauralethe]

Chiang Mai / Wat Rong Khun janvier 2017

[lauralethe]

Took this a few days ago walking along the Chiang Mai moat, listening to Lou Reed, and feeling a lot of feelings I was pretty happy to feel. I ended up running into a huge tree full of birds chirping so loud it sounded like cries, and this quote from The Amber Spyglass came to my mind: 'There was a strange sound, like the murmur and crackle you hear before you realize that what you're hearing is your house on fire'.

△

[lauralethe]

Bad timing is the only timing I know. I move somewhere only weeks after one of my best friends living there goes overseas. I get closer to people the summer before they hope on a plane for another time zone. I start listening to bands and find out they just split. I get into schools across the country right after buying drums. I quit jobs to start living again and paralyzing depression hits. I fall in love with people who want to leave. In a few places in northern Thailand, at some point during winter for a very short time span, you can catch a wild variety of sakura blooming. It’s called the Tiger Queen. The dates are never quite the same, and the trees are hidden in the mountains. Getting there not too early and not too late requires a little planning, and a very lucky timing. So you get why today was kind of a big deal.

[lauralethe]

Bangkok, janvier 2017

Je pense jamais à prendre des photos de ce qui est important.

[lauralethe]

Les robes d'été - à voix haute #22

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J'aurais pu attendre un mois, attendre de fêter la première année de cette newsletter, mais dans un mois, si tout se passe comme prévu, je serai quelque part entre Kuala Lumpur et Angkor, couverte d'anti-moustique, en boule sur un siège de bus - ou dans une situation approchante. Je saute dans un avion dans moins d'une semaine pour aller faire prendre l'air à ma tête et apprendre à mettre de la distance là où je n'ai jamais su ne serait-ce que placer une respiration. La relative régularité des publications va clairement en prendre un coup, mais en attendant, je ne pouvais pas partir sans vous laisser un petit cadeau. Ça parle de bisexualité, mais  et ça m'a presque fait pleurer. C'est pas la première fois, vous me direz. (Et sans vouloir étaler ma réclame, sinon, sachez que si ça vous intéresse, mon dernier zine est épuisé en version papier mais dispo en PDF, je mets le lien tout en bas, voilà, j'ai fini, poutous.) Cassidy Foust - "The Knife That Carves"

There’s a boy in my fiction class who’s gaze slides down every girls sundress. His eyes are full of kleptomania as if He’s already planning what parts of their bodies he would steal first. I watch him as he does this I know when he stares at me My heartbeat turns pouring rain against my chest but, Sometimes my gaze slides down the same girls sundress And I wonder what she tastes like, Don’t ask her name but I wonder how she feels cupped in my palm. Sometimes I describe my breasts as apples, or grapefruit, or melons, Treat my body as something to devour. Name it as if its something used for consumption. I’ve been learning this for years: My body silver platter just for their enjoyment. So sometimes I forget that being prey Doesn’t mean that I can’t be hunter. And then it’s saturday, and I’m with my best friend Our bodies numb with alcohol, And I’m straddling her, Our clothing shed like a snakeskin train from my couch to my bedroom, And most of this night is a blur: Hands, tongues, breasts, breasts Our bodies knotting together like ivy. This new flesh that is so close to my own. We ask “is this ok”, “is this ok”, “is this ok” And we spit the words out to quickly Neither wanting to be the one left holding on, The one who forgets to fill the space with permission. So when I black out that night I don’t worry. I assume my lips have carried out their script. Assume I know what trespass feels like, I would have stopped before I got there. But I’ve been learning this for years: My body beast, her body feast, My body never the knife that carves it. I may not crack the bone, but I do drink the marrow. Sometimes it so sweet that I forget that the violence is still mine. So, I don’t text my friend in the morning. I don’t wonder if my breathe left scars. I check under the bed every night for monsters, but never the mirror. Not because I do not know what lurks But because this beast is a part of me I do not know how to kill. Believe me I’ve tried. I only masturbate to the thought of straight boys, And I’ve stopped talking to cute girls at parties And this is not a fear of wanting them, But a fear that I don’t know how to love any way but devouring. But I’m still staring at the sundress, And I still haven’t texted my best friend, And no matter how gently I hold her hands I’m scared I still have claws. ---------- Demain il Fera Nuit (PDF) : https://payhip.com/b/dmwj

[lauralethe]

Tremblant - à voix haute #21

Est-ce que ce matin vous a été clément ? Est-ce que le soleil tapait à votre fenêtre, alors même que vous aviez cessé de l'attendre, est-ce que vous pouviez laisser votre tête enfouie dans l'obscurité juste une seconde de plus, est-ce que vos bras avaient la place de s'étendre, est-ce que vos yeux s'ouvraient en premier, ou alors attendaient que vous les y poussiez, est-ce que regarder le plafond vous donnait envie de sauter sur vos pieds ? Pour les autres, pour qui chaque réveil ressemble à une falaise au bord de laquelle il faut marcher les yeux fermés en attendant l'inéluctable éboulement, qui sait à quel moment, celui-ci est pour vous. Je suis juste derrière. Laura Welsh "How to Break Yourself Whole"

---------- I know i was born on what must have been a cold and dark night in the beginning of February and ever since, i've tried to find a way to carve all this February back out of my bones. I know what it is to not being able to hear the sound of yourself thinking over the sound of your voice rattling of all this dark, all this cold. I know what it is, to have a hole in your chest the size of home. I am always all full of leaving, i know how to keep choosing all this alone, i know that sometimes you will walk outside and the light will hurt your eyes, i have learned how to hide myself from myself, to not see the light, i know what it is to crawl in your empty bed at the end of the day alone, i can summon demons to my bedside, i can lead monsters by the hand out of the closet and ask them to stay the night just so i don't have to sleep with all the ghosts of my ghosts, i know how to force-feed the empty, how to fell the blank space with anything i can shove inside it, i have learned how it feels when the plug gets pulled and you can't stop draining, i know how much it hurts when your intentions won't stop spilling all over everything, i know how to be the one holding the burning match, how to look at everything i've been building and just drop it because fuck it, how was anything i've ever created worth anyways, i can watch the world burn and feel nothing. I know that it doesn't make a goddam difference if it's half-empty or half-full on the days when your heart is breaking, i have picked up a shovel, i've watched my own two hands stop listening, i understand what it is to not be able to stop digging, i know what it is to accidentally dig up your own soul, i know how it feels to have nowhere to put it, it know how it feels to be too damn apathetic to put it back where it came from when you find out this stupid hole is the only place it will ever be at home, i know how it feels to be too scared of being touched because somebody might find it, i know how it feels to be too scared to touch it myself, i know how it is to call out to god, i know how it is to believe god will not come. I've learned how to lose. I know how to turn the grief of mourning into celebration, how to see the morning light and praise my own existence, i know how to see the sun rising and praise the existence of you, i see everything as fluid, i see myself pouring my hope into the beauty of you, i am spilling all over everything, i am telling you we are all spilling out of our skins and it is beautiful. i've been looking at mirrors, and i'm finally starting to see myself, and i know how to see you in my own reflection, i know that you are never more beautiful than when your hands are shaking, i know how to whisper "it's okay, my hands are shaking too", i know how to hold your shaking hands and show you the light inside of yourself, i know how to let your ands go and still carry your light with me, i've found out how to let go of the lonely, i am carrying you with me, i am breaking of pieces of myself for you to carry me with you and when the end comes, we get to go on for ever, i know that believing is a choice, i know that faith is practice, i know that we are brave, i know that my god is love, i know that god is all of us here together existing, forever cracking ourselves open, forever reaching to be unbroken, we're going to make it, okay? i've found out how to fill the holes, and the dark, and the empty. You take my hand now. It will be shaking, it is light, you are light, we are light, i am light. i know how we survive, and i'm taking you all with me. Survival is love.

[lauralethe]

La version papier de mon zine Demain il Fera Nuit est épuisée !

Je me répète encore plus que d’habitude, mais j’ai été super touchée par chaque achat et chaque retour que vous avez pu faire ; ce zine était très important pour moi, parce qu’il encapsule un moment spécial de ma vie, une conversation avec ma santé mentale que j’ai capturée jour après jour, en filigrane, entre deux conseils de restos canadiens.

Comme je n’ai pas prévu d’en tirer de nouveaux exemplaires, j’ai compilé le zine en PDF. Vous pouvez vous le procurer ici sur la plateforme Payhip. Il est à prix libre à partir d’1€.

Et si le zine vous a plu, prêtez-le, parlez-en, ou partagez le lien !

[lauralethe]

Monstresses - à voix haute #20

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Je ne sais pas d'où vient cette idée qu'on revient toujours à ses premiers amours. Je préfèrerais éviter de retrouver le style vestimentaire de mes onze ans, ou l'amour brûlant pour certains musiciens français (du style à jouer de la basse dans des ascenseurs) qui a occupé une partie de mon adolescence. Les décisions qui nous hantent ou les obsessions qui s'installent dans nos poches intérieures, elles, sont simplement là pour rester. Cette vidéo est l'une des premières qui me soit tombée dessus par hasard, à l'époque où je découvrais à peine que la poésie était aussi une langue vivante. L'image est floue, le son est faible, ces meufs sont merveilleuses, et si quelque chose vous gêne dans les premières strophes, restez quand même. Promis.

Hannah Halpern, Amina Iro, Reina Privado, & Asha Gardner - Women's Halloween (Monsters)

Ces quatre poétesses faisaient partie de la Youth Slam Team 2013, un programme de l'association Split this Rock à DC.

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Every year for Halloween, I wanted to be a Pumpkin Sunflower M & M Turtle

But when you get older, the costumes tend to get smaller Finessing curves into eye candy instead of masterpiece 'American' beauty turned apple pie cutie, So this year I decided to be a...

School teacher Nurse Fairy Wonderwoman

But when I went to buy the costume I was like “Where’s the rest of it?”

Is b for books or boobs? Was the tooth fairy a stripper? to check temperatures or raise them? Oh hell no. Heels?

Halloween has become a different type of...freak show And all that I am don’t fit prettily into polyester and spandex I’d much rather be

Sasquatch, Godzilla, King Kong, Lochness,

Goblin, Ghoul, a zombie with no conscience... Everybody knows I’M A MOTHERFUCKING MONSTER!

Society is trying to squeeze the fantasy out of us Turn our feminine fatal So this year l think I'll be monster

Let me be Mummy... Empty of all organs, so they’d never fail me Only my heart would remain The center of intelligence and emotion But I’d never need to feel another pair of greedy eyes on me. ... monster.

I’d much rather be vampire my reflection disappearing every time i look in the mirror so I wouldn't have to worry about Flaws that stare blankly back at me I will suck every woman stereotype out of your throat ... monster

I’ve heard that some of the most beautiful women are the craziest ones! On a bad day, I’m human On a full moon, werewolf I exist when the lunar tics ticking til the time comes when I am finally comfortable in my own skin. ... monster

Let me be your worst nightmare for one night. I'll shed my wings and Betsy Johnson's and play boogie. I know what you're afraid of A woman who can do bad - no, evil all by herself! because nowadays boogie man is a lot less frightening than a strong woman

But no matter what garments we wrap ourselves in A Woman’s Status as Trick, Treat, or geek is not up for discussion. A woman dressing, acting, being, should be HER CHOICE If a woman wears a skimpy outfit let it be HER CHOICE If a woman wants to be covered up let it be HER CHOICE If i wanna be a motherfucking monster, then let it be MY CHOICE

Is b for books or boobs?   BOTH to check temperatures or raise them?    BOTH Was the tooth fairy a stripper?   Maybe, but who cares? I’m still not wearing heels.

[lauralethe]

Novembre dans mon portable de mauvaise qualité. 

La lumière dans la chambre d’hôpital, un golden milk trop chaud, Sasha le cactus genderfluid, la lune un soir où j’ai beaucoup pleuré en marchant dehors à deux heures du matin, le ciel qui brûle depuis ma fenêtre, une paroi du métro en forme d’animal étrange qui fait la planche, les petites choses qui marquent la peau, et ce qui arrive quand ça part tout seul.

[lauralethe]

- laura lethe