It’s that time, right? Red rocks, cactus margaritas, whatever signifies vacation to any of you.

I was recently notified that a piece of writing I had submitted months ago to So to Speak would be published in the summer online issue. There are things about my submission which had led to an initial rejection, and I am unaware of what internal decision-making had been performed which resulted in the work’s final acceptance.

Margarita Ríos-Farjat‘s, “Cafe in Pioneer Square”  has a special place in my heart because it was my first: the first poem Margarita sent me, and the first I translated.

In her shining evocation of paranoia, obsession, and oppression in relationships (in this case, a mother-child dynamic) she controls voice through writing short bursts of poems as a mother who has little control of her own.

Honestly, I’m just trying to write good stories. If they stick with people and bring up issues that start people talking, all the better.

I think we’re in an interesting moment with regard to the term “feminist.”