JL Tooker
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JL Tooker
@jltooker.bsky.social
210 followers 260 following 100 posts
Speculative tales, poetic trails, and a soul tuned to resonance.
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JL Tooker @jltooker.bsky.social · 8d
NEW series on Substack called AUTHORKIND ARCHETYPES.

It explores how writers tend to work—not by genre or advice, but by creative disposition.

If this resonates, subscribing (free) is the best way to receive future Archetype posts in your inbox.

read.jltooker.com/subscribe

#Writer #creativity
Wander Words by JL Tooker | Substack
Wander Words by JL Tooker is a space for storytellers, deep thinkers, and curious minds to explore the intersections of wonder, reflection, and the written word. Click to read Wander Words by JL Tooke...
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jltooker.bsky.social
Why is DNA So Sexy?

a new poem by JL Tooker
read.jltooker.com

#Poetry #sciart #biology #DNA #PsychSciSky
a poem titled "Why is DNA So Sexy?" written by JL Tooker on a blurred red background with strands of DNA protruding from the left side
February 10, 2026 at 7:36 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
AuthorKind Archetypes - if you've followed the series, I have a small reflection for you to understand where you might be in your creative journey:

read.jltooker.com/p/authorkind...
AuthorKind Archetypes (4): A Reflective Questionnaire
A reflective questionnaire for writers exploring the AuthorKind Archetypes. This post offers a gentle way to notice where you are in the creative cycle, without defining who you are or how you should ...
read.jltooker.com
February 9, 2026 at 4:41 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
AuthorKind Archetypes - the third pair for your consideration:
read.jltooker.com/p/authorkind...

#Archetypes #WritersLife #Craft
AuthorKind Archetypes (3): The Offerer & The Guardian
The Offerer and the Guardian are AuthorKind Archetypes that shape how creative work enters the world. This essay explores the balance between sharing and protecting work, and how discernment—not fear ...
read.jltooker.com
February 9, 2026 at 4:40 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
Monday morning quarterback???

“Nay,” she said.

Dust and Horses instead.

read.jltooker.com/p/dust-and-h...

This week’s Echoes from the Wander is live now!

#WritingCommunity #Clydesdales #SuperBowl #Poetry in motion
Dust and Horses
09 February 2026
read.jltooker.com
February 9, 2026 at 4:37 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
"A Sideways Return"

Return is rarely straight - a phaiku sequence

#Phaiku #Haiku #Poetry #SkyPoet #WritingCommunity
On a background of solar falre sits a vert translucent whiskey tasting glass, and a phaiku / haiku sequence written by JL Tooker aka jlynn: first run exquisite / bias dances on my tongue / impatience resumes lingering whisper / smoothness betrays your power / wrapped in cool crystal pale gold, full-bodied / sweetness outrunning pepper / solstice warm and spared slowly we dabble / my mind pushing mutter / solstice comes sideways satisfaction flares / fullness dissipates empties / absence rings clear
February 6, 2026 at 5:06 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
Where are you on your creative path"

Not a test, but a reflection ... read.jltooker.com/p/authorkind...

#Creativity #Craft #WritersLife #Poetry
AuthorKind Archetypes (4): A Reflective Questionnaire
A reflective questionnaire for writers exploring the AuthorKind Archetypes. This post offers a gentle way to notice where you are in the creative cycle, without defining who you are or how you should ...
read.jltooker.com
February 6, 2026 at 2:55 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
"The final two AuthorKind Archetypes are concerned not with making the work, but with how—and whether—it enters the world."

AUTHORKIND ARCHETYPES
The Offerer and The Gather - live now!

read.jltooker.com/p/authorkind...

#WritingCommunity #Craft #Writer #Creativity #WritersLife
AuthorKind Archetypes (3): The Offerer & The Guardian
The Offerer and the Guardian are AuthorKind Archetypes that shape how creative work enters the world. This essay explores the balance between sharing and protecting work, and how discernment—not fear ...
read.jltooker.com
February 5, 2026 at 2:38 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
The second pair of AuthorKind Archetypes is now live on Substack: read.jltooker.com/p/authorkind...

Meet the Articulator and The Shaper. Do they sound familiar?

#AmWriting #Creativity #WriterCommunity #philsci #PsychSciSky
AuthorKind Archetypes (2): The Articulator & The Shaper
The Articulator and the Shaper are AuthorKind Archetypes that describe how creative work moves from expression to refinement. This essay explores how articulation and shaping function best as compleme...
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February 4, 2026 at 6:02 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
The first AuthorKind Archetype is now live.

This one begins with The Gatherer — the writer shaped by attention, accumulation, and noticing-as-method.

Full post here: read.jltooker.com/p/authorkind...

(Subscribe if you’d like future Archetypes delivered to your inbox.)

#WritingCommunity #Essays
AuthorKind Archetypes (1): The Gatherer & The Incubator
The first AuthorKind Archetypes—The Gatherer and The Incubator—explore two foundational creative states often mistaken for inactivity. This essay reframes intake and gestation as necessary phases of c...
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February 3, 2026 at 5:04 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
How writers work matters as much as what they write.
AuthorKind Archetypes → read.jltooker.com/p/authorkind...

#writing #craft #creativity
Re-Introducing the AuthorKind Archetypes
An introduction to the AuthorKind Archetypes—a framework for understanding creativity not as identity, but as movement. This opening essay invites writers and creatives to notice where they are in the...
read.jltooker.com
February 2, 2026 at 3:53 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
NEW series on Substack called AUTHORKIND ARCHETYPES.

It explores how writers tend to work—not by genre or advice, but by creative disposition.

If this resonates, subscribing (free) is the best way to receive future Archetype posts in your inbox.

read.jltooker.com/subscribe

#Writer #creativity
Wander Words by JL Tooker | Substack
Wander Words by JL Tooker is a space for storytellers, deep thinkers, and curious minds to explore the intersections of wonder, reflection, and the written word. Click to read Wander Words by JL Tooke...
read.jltooker.com
February 2, 2026 at 3:48 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
A phaiku — a hybrid haiku form that resists closure.

#Poetry #haiku #philsci #BlueSkyPoet

read.jltooker.com
A fluid background of gold-tone curls and waves as a background to a phaiku / haiku written by JL Tooker: can you imagine / a wonder you cannot name / diametric gaze
January 30, 2026 at 5:14 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
Congratulations on a beautiful haiku and its publication in such a beautiful journal.
January 30, 2026 at 12:38 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
handdraawn digital sketch of a simple desk holding a pen and a draft document and above the desk is the comment "Still her" with something having been erased after the letters "her". No. 2 in a developing series of comic-style frames.
January 29, 2026 at 5:20 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
My first Fib.
Read more at: read.jltooker.com/p/fibonacci-...

#poetry #Fibonacci #sciart #writer
A multi-colored grid image depicting the Fibonacci sprial with a Fib or Fibonacci poem written by JL Toker below: blue / bird / above / rushes home / to feed the nesters / daddy blue always true to fate
January 29, 2026 at 5:15 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
#poetry #creativity #WritersLife #Poem #BlueSkyPoet
a poem written on a faded background of ancient cuneiform. the poem is title "Return" and is written by JL Tooker, and reads: before the voice wanted freedom / it wanted to last / marks for floods / names for seasons / a way to say / "this happened" / expression speaks to the moment / memory speaks when no one is left to answer / I am listening backward
January 27, 2026 at 2:04 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
Are poetry and math a match made in heaven? Sometimes it feels that way.
read.jltooker.com/p/what-poetr...

#Poetry #Mathematics #Haiku #Basho
What Poetry and Math Share—Constraint, Record, and the Refusal of Closure
Why do some texts remain usable across centuries while others age quickly?
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January 23, 2026 at 8:44 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
If it's cold and you know it, you know what to do, but if winter storm is not your thing, above all else be safe!

Poetry and tea provides warmth.

#Poetry #weather #SkyWriter #BecauseICare
screenprint images in hues of blue depicting winter weather warnings overlaid with a poem by jlynn aka JL Tooker: whether weather / wasting wonder / while warning and watch / steal the thunder / brace for storm’s embrace / then / face / nature’s inevitable grace
January 23, 2026 at 4:50 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
a mostly blank comic-style square with only the words "Still here" and an inscription ~M
January 21, 2026 at 3:28 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
Have you ever heard a T. rex coo?

#phaiku #Haiku #Dinosaurs #Extinction #SkyPoet #CreativeWriter

Read more: read.jltooker.com/p/extinction...
watercolor sketch of dinosaur with words of a haiku / phaiku overlaid: coos rumbles and booms / feathered cloaks and owl vision / climate change still killed written by JL Tooker
January 20, 2026 at 3:17 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
Oh bother. I attempted a sestina, learned why form pushes back, and discovered a smaller, sharper teacher along the way. Notes from the near-miss (and the tritina that saved me).

#SkyPoet #Poetry #PoetsofBlueSky #Sestina #Tritina

read.jltooker.com/p/oh-bother-...
Oh Bother: A Poet Attempts the Sestina
I sat with a new writing group about a year ago, which prompted attendees to write a sestina.
read.jltooker.com
January 13, 2026 at 2:17 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
Origin of Sunu and O - An Ancestral Biet Lagos Myth

read.jltooker.com/p/recorded-b...

#Mythology #SFF #SciFiWriters #BietLagos #Creativity
Recorded Beneath the Ice
Some stories are not composed.
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January 8, 2026 at 4:15 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
a new phaiku ... just in time.

#Phaiku #SkyPoet #Haiku #Poetry #WritersInTheSky #MedicalMagic
a foggy window pain with a phaiku / haiku superimposed, reading: shock it all stall / reaching to contain chaos / rhythm screams once more by JL Tooker
January 6, 2026 at 3:06 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
My working manifesto:

Still curious.
Still Here.
Still—
Reaching.

#WritingCommunity #Creativity #Philosophy #SkyPoet
diluted image of a stone cairn with these words carved: STILL, CURIOUS, HERE, REACHING
January 5, 2026 at 6:51 PM
jltooker.bsky.social
#WIPSnips - calm
From my WIP, World Beyond the Song ...

#SFF #WritingCommunity #AmWritingSciFi #Sentience #Kushner
a snippet of text from WIP World Beyond the Song by JL Tooker. It reads: o2’s voice was calm and precise. “None of us can be human in isolation,” they stated, as if quoting a well-known proverb. Jayla blinked and turned to the AI, startled by the weight of the words. “Kushner,” she said, her voice quieter. “When All You Ever Wanted Isn’t Enough. I read it years ago. Funny. It didn’t seem so important then.” “It seems important now,” o2 replied, their tone softer.
January 3, 2026 at 8:05 PM