Welcome

Editor of anthology to be published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Gender Recovery seeks essays and poetry by trans, two-spirit, and nonbinary people on the triumphs and trials of recovery. call info→ 

Zine series offering words of encouragement, love, and reflection from alumni of color to graduating seniors of color. I organized, recruited, and edited submissions, and I designed the layout. vol i 2017→ & vol ii 2018→  

QUEER OF COLOR LYRICISM

To guide their research and creative work, Ariel asks: what does lyricism offer queer creators of color in the midst of racism and cultural celebration; homophobia and queer kinship; transphobia and gender possibility? And, in turn, what do queer creators of color offer lyrical creative enterprises with their experiments in form?

RED ROOM, BIG HOUSE: E L JAMES’ “FIFTY SHADES” AND THE PRAXIS OF A NEOLIBERAL DOMESTIC

Completed after two years of research through the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. In this capstone paper, I argue that the neoliberal project of the Fifty Shades series appropriates BDSM and any potential for radical reimaginings through kinky practice. The series understands BDSM difference only as a means to support a wealth-based, heteronormative view for modern relationship constructions.

OF SCARCITY AND HALF-CENTS: MATERIALITY AND ALLOWANCES IN FREDERICK DOUGLASS' NARRATIVE

Essay which received the Harry Scherman Writing Award in the category of Literary Essay, presented to best essay written by a graduating English major. In this essay I explore how The Narrative examines many sites of materiality, particularly through the theme of allowances, which I include to mean all material goods allowed to a slave by a slave owner. 

A COMPROMISED COLLECTIVITY ACROSS SPICED DISHARMONIES

Anthology published by Lambda Literary. This lyrical essay offers a speculative response to a racist question. | “i am of they (plural) because we are a song of they (plural). they—this they, this here, hear this, this they who breathe a rhythm—a fraught rhythm of they/them/theirs&ours.../ours.../ours.../centuries-long ours of our mothers&muthas&aunties rhymes. we exist in these psalms we’re spitting;” 

TONES OF THE CAPARAZÓN, OR: THE LIZARD BRAIN'S RESPONSE TO MISGENDERING BY FOLKS WHO SHOULD KNOW BETTER

Anthology published by Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Here, I look at how being a survivor of violence affects my ability to understand anger, both my own and the anger I anticipate from others when I correct their misgendering. link→ 

THE NOT NOT-OUT TRANSQUEER TRANSITIVE PROPERTY OF CLOTHING STORAGE UNITS 

Anthology published in e-book form. In this humorous essay, I argue that the closet metaphor is both too singular a metaphor for how I segment my queerness online, and also inaccurate given my family's use of trash bags for storing our clothes. link→ This work is also included in Hoax Zine (Issue #13). link→ 

HEALING EXCHANGES: THE NECESSITY OF BELOVED COMMUNITY FOR QUEER SURVIVORS OF COLOR

Lambda Literary Award-winning anthology published by Arsenal Pulp. I demonstrate that for truly sustainable living, queer survivors of color's health must be understood alongside beloved community. My essay recognizes the kinds of health and healing that occur beyond just that which is held within a single body. link→

ENDEARMENTS AND INDICTMENTS FOR THE TRANS FAN IMAGINARY

Lit mag published by Damaged Good Books. This essay explores the exploding creative avenue at the intersection of trans and fan online communities. I include a reflection on my own excited writings as a teen that developed into a more critical engagement as a slightly more mature fan of color. link→ 

BRINGING SEXY MAC

Weekly column for college paper. During my three-year tenure as a columnist, I wrote 55 articles on beloved community, intimate health, surviving violence, and the politics of love. Word count averaged at 1000 words per article.

KNOWN (NOT): KINDRED AND THE CRISIS OF INTIMACY ACROSS EPISTEMOLOGIES

Academic journal published by MMUF. In Kindred, Octavia Butler explores the subtlety of slavery’s sexual violence that cannot be accounted for within the historical record. As a traveler to the past, the narrator Dana may understand her narrative double’s conflicts with intimacy to a point. However, as I argue in this essay, Dana will never truly know the sexual violence felt within the bodies of Black slave women. link→ 

ARTIST BOOK (“THEY KNEW. THEY ALWAYS KNEW.”)

Collage artist book shown at exhibition curated by Yasmeen Abedifard and Marsha Taichman.

POEM (“WHEN I TAKE A STEP, I MAKE A QUEER SOUND.”

Lit mag published by Bien Acompañada Press out of Cornell University. | “i cannot be silence: the body expels this—our awed wisdom—through its waking existence.”

TWO POEMS (“DEAD BABY DROP” AND “CRUMBLE RED INTO MARROW”)

Anthology published by Tia Chucha Press. “The Wandering Song” is the first-ever comprehensive literary survey of the Central American diaspora by a U.S. publisher. | “Push in far enough to grab at it. Palm curled / Brick. Pull as hard as I pushed. I rip it out—every / Fucking brick.” link→ 

POEM (“CONSIDERATIONS FOR THE ERGOSPHERE”)

Lit mag published by Macalester College. | “we edge a line of then—there, out—and now—a scene, a time, an impossible plane where a single word if uttered implodes the universe.”