Recently we invited our advisory board members to tell us what is on their minds these days, to share their current projects, milestones, and emerging collaborations. Judy’s is the second report in this series.
The excitement of three new publications all in the same season is overwhelming me with gratitude. Nightboat Books in collaboration with Julie Enszer of Sinister Wisdom have produced a gorgeous edition of Eruptions of Inanna: Justice, Gender, and Erotic Power. This set of essays retells some of her lesser-known stories interwoven with her well-known stories and compares the work of one of her poets with crucial passages in the Book of Job. Inanna continues to step forward as relevant to our times—a tangible, real power—the more we learn about her.
Equally beautifully designed in its own way (the cat on the cover!), Touching Creatures, Touching Spirit: Living in a Sentient World is out from Red Hen Press in Pasadena. I used some of these true stories as the basis for my February salon for ASWM. I enjoyed this event immensely, as who doesn’t love talking about creatures and psychic interactions to an audience of spiritual cultural feminists? I find that my stories, some of which scared me to write, inspire people to remember and tell their own stories and that is just what needs to happen.
Thirdly, Gregory Gajus at Commonality Institute (which promotes my work) designed a powerful small volume, Descent to the Roses of a Family: A Poet’s Journey into Anti-Racism for Personal and Social Healing. My friend and colleague Dianne Jenett and I taught this fourteen-page poem and backstory notes as an experimental approach to dissolving white supremacy from within the white psyche, letting participants get out of their heads and into their own experiences, especially those of childhood. Our first set of four classes has had some promising breakthroughs, so we may continue. We also plan to teach a summer course on goddess Inanna’s literature, addressing gender, justice, and erotic power, co-sponsored by D’vorah Grenn’s Lilith’s Circle, and Commonality Institute.
I have other plans to write study notes for each of my nine-part social justice poems (all of which are collected in Hanging on Our Own Bones). I may take on Mental next. And Gregory is urging me to write an updated introduction so he can produce a new edition of my 1984 book, Another Mother Tongue: Gay Words, Gay Worlds. Is this all too much effort? Nope. Feels good, gives me some optimism.
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