thique poetique

On my heaviest days I look to photos of my favorite writers basking in joy. Toni Morrison dancing at Studio 54. James Baldwin getting down with the hitchhike. Maya Angelou and Amiri Baraka dancing at the New York Public Library. These evidences of joy are my muses to continue writing but, moreso than that, to be present in living my life. Black joy is the archive of refusal. We refuse to become what anti-Blackness tries to make of us.

A keynote speech I delivered for Black History Month at Anaheim Union High School District I was invited to do the keynote address at for the sixth annual Black History Month celebration for Anaheim Union High School District. This is the high school district I attended during my tender teenage years. The event was held at the high school I graduated from.

Share from 0:00 0:00 / 0:00 Paid episode The full episode is only available to paid subscribers of this. Motherlands Virtual Book Launch with Galleyway a conversation on writing, community building, and crafting your lick back When I was planning my book launch for Motherlands I knew I wanted to support the organizations that have been supporting my career. The first organization I decided to collaborate with was Galleyway, a Black woman owned organization and consulting agency.

I had the good fortune of being interview on Daniel Dissinger’s Writing Remix Podcast. We talked about poetry, grassroots organizing, and making writing accessible to others. I’m quite proud of this conversation on the everything that poetry is to our society.

I’m someone fascinated with the idea that the angels have their own language. I often wonder if a part of the ancestral journey is to rise into the language as if one were breaching the water’s surface. And I’m fixated on the scenes in every religious text when the angels spoke to humans: did they speak in the human’s native language or did they speak in their own language Did the angels invite humans to have the rare experience of knowing?

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Hi everyone in substacklandia, It’s my favorite time in substack land: the book round up. For the past few years I’ve loved reading other folks’ reading roundup, but I didn’t think to give it a try. Welp, I’m trying it now. I hope your next bookstore visit includes one or two recommendations from me. I’d love to know… How has your read of reading been? Did you read any of the books in my list? Is there a book you want to read from my list? Tell me, what were your favorite books of 2025?

My Filipina mom has Thanksgiving in a clutch hold. She’s the one making the spread for the entirety of our Filipinx family. She has a thick binder with the words “In the Kitchen with Pellie” printed along the cover. She has special Thanksgiving pots. One year, my cousins and I tried to cook a thanksgiving meal potluck style for the aunties and uncles and my mom secretly cooked her usual spread and surprised us with it.

We moved into our new house over the summertime, just before the heatwave. This house has no air conditioning, and the property manager let us know there’s no immediate plans to install one. The heatwave came after we unpacked our things and tried to make a home out of this house. My husband prioritized putting up window AC units to protect the kids and I spent a lot of money on ice cream. It felt like the heat would last forever. We were suspicious of October’s cool. “Mommy.

I’m currently in the throes of planning my book tour for Motherlands. There will be additional projects that come with it that I’m very excited to share with you all. But, for now, I’m figuring out how to be present on substack and sustaining this community while doing book promotion and traveling. I created a survey for free and paid subscribers to fill out. Can you help me plan how to best show up on substack in 2026?