Sharper Than A Serpent's Tooth

As a reader, I tend to prefer it. Physical violence is not very present in my own life, and if the book is supposed to be escapist fantasy like HR/TLG, reading about a lot of violence pulls me out of that.

But also I just see female-authored MM (or MM intended for a female audience) as largely its own genre where the goal is not verisimilitude. I've mentioned this here and there but I basically compare it to male drag, where men play with femininity as a costume both for fun and to explore their own gender identity. Drag is titillating, it's hyper feminine, and everyone gets that the goal is not an accurate depiction of womanhood.

her name was Marsha P Johnson, and we have her to thank for so much.

remember, the first Pride was a riot, and she was one of the brave souls who endured it to help carve the path which so many of us walk today. she helped found several activist groups regarding LGBT safety and wellbeing. and she was absolutely radiant, too.

by Billy Collins

I am like the Japanese poet who longed to be in Kyoto even though he was already in Kyoto.

I am not exactly like him because I am not Japanese and I have no idea what Kyoto is like.

But once, while walking around the Irish town of Ballyvaughan I caught myself longing to be in Ballyvaughan.

The sensation of being homesick for a place that is not my home while being right in the middle of it

was particularly strong when I passed the hotel bar then the fluorescent depth of a launderette,

also when I stood at the crossroads with the road signs pointing in 3 directions and the enormous buses making the turn.

It might have had something to do with the nearby limestone hills and the rain collecting on my collar,

but then again I have longed to be with a number of people while the two of us were sitting in a room

on an ordinary evening without a limestone hill in sight, thousands of miles from Kyoto

and the simple wonders of Ballyvaughan, which reminds me of another Japanese poet