Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Sep 1

Nominate work, litmag editors!! We can't wait to start reading the definitely incredible subs <3

Monarch Queer Literary Awards @monarch.gay · Sep 1

The Monarch Queer Literary Awards are now open for nominations until November 30, 2025!

Visit our website (monarch.gay) to learn more about us and how editors can nominate work. 🦋

We're open! Monarch Queer Literary Awards, September 1 to November 20, 2025, monarch.gay

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Aug 12

I'm getting a tattoo today, which is a lot of pain for a lot of beauty at the end of it and then that made me think about the poetry editing process which is similar, and then I thought that it's TWO MONTHS EXACTLY since my debut came out, which you can buy at this link❤️
share.google/unJW7opFecm3...

kith in print

Through the language of myth, legend, and religion, Qetsi'ah Joachim-Baggott's Gospels for the Tongue-Tied looks ahead to adulthood through the eyes of an autistic ungendered being womaned before god....

share.google

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Monarch Queer Literary Awards @monarch.gay · Aug 6

Lit mag editors, would you like to submit work for consideration for the Monarch Queer Literary Awards? Check out our submission guidelines so you know what's eligible (and what isn't).

Submissions open September 1:

Submission Guidelines - Monarch Queer Literary Awards

When to submit We will accept submissions from September 1, 2025 through November 30, 2025. All decisions will be sent within a month after the reading period closes. We aim to publish an anthology of...

monarch.gay

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Aug 1

So excited to be on the team for this beautiful award!!!! Please submit to us, editors, it'll be exciting and beautiful and fun!

Monarch Queer Literary Awards @monarch.gay · Aug 1

Hello, friends! We're Monarch Queer Literary Awards, a project of @fifthwheelpress.bsky.social. Monarch is a new anthology recognizing the best new queer writing and art published by literary magazines and independent presses. 🦋

Submissions open September 1. Until then, get to know us: monarch.gay

Hi, we’re Monarch. Monarch Queer Literary Awards is a new anthology recognizing the best new queer writing and art published by literary magazines and independent presses. We aim to uplift the groundbreaking and often under-celebrated poems, short stories, essays, and artwork that are published in magazines, chapbooks, zines, and other collections.

More about Monarch. We want to celebrate excellence in all regards: great writing and great community stewardship. While submissions from both emerging and established publications will (of course) be given equal consideration, we really hope to see some of our longstanding community members come out and join us in the revelry of it all!

Submit to Monarch. We will accept submissions from September 1 through November 30, 2025. Submissions must come from the editor or editors of the publication. Journals and independent presses are eligible. The work must have been initially published between July 1, 2024 and June 30, 2025, either online or in print.

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D.W. Baker @lowermelody.bsky.social · Jun 27

mail day! it's the new @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social from @kithbooks.bsky.social, GOSPELS FOR THE TONGUE-TIED

www.kithbooks.com/shop/p/gospels

GOSPELS FOR THE TONGUE-TIED,
by Qetsiah Joachim-Baggott,
featuring a dark brown background with sepia colored line drawings of a dissected beetle

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Reposted by ✨ Q ✨

Variant Literature @variantlit.bsky.social · Jun 10

Join MJ Gomez and Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott for Birdsong, Wildfires, and Faith: A Poetry Reading hosted by Variant Lit. Sunday, June 22 10 a.m. EST / 3 p.m. BST. Live on Zoom.

@bluejayverses.bsky.social @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social @kithbooks.bsky.social

Register:
us06web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

Join MJ Gomez and Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott for Birdsong, Wildfires, and Faith: A Poetry Reading hosted by Variant Lit. Sunday, June 22 at 10 a.m. EST / 3 p.m. BST. Live on Zoom

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Reposted by ✨ Q ✨

✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Jun 12

AAAAAHHH!!!! ITS RELEASE DAY!!!
If you were holding off before there's no excuse now, please buy my book!!!

kith books @kithbooks.bsky.social · Jun 12

Gospels For the Tongue-Tied
by Qetsiah Baggott-Joachim

HAPPY RELEASE DAY, @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social!!!

get your copy now!
Print: kithbooks.com/shop/p/gospels
eBook: kithbooks.com/digital/p/gospels

A beetle separated and reduced to its external anatomical components is rendered in a glowing light orange on a background of rich dark reddish brown. Text reading "GOSPELS FOR THE TONGUE-TIED" AND "QETSIAH JOACHIM-BAGGOT" appear at the top and bottom respectively in the same orange.

text:
"Each poem in gospels is urgent, each poem is wild"
- Aldrin Badiola

THIS GARDEN IS REMEMBERED

The story of the earth is a pine tree, is a garden
Broken into shards of glass, of poison
Is pieced back together drunkenly, stupidly,
By a wanderer with sharp eyes he drinks the tar and lets it burn
his flesh from the inside.
He greets himself as God and like a moth to flames
Followers flock to his side
They tell him stories he burns their wings
and yet is forgiven.
On the hillside at dusk.when the sun sinks below the earth’s belly
A disciple is offered a bloodied hand
As reward for services rendered,
A traitor rises to take the silver
And sells his old beloved
Onto the cross. the father turns his face away
the mother touches her stomach
as though this betrayal is a difficult labour
his mistakes corrode his bones
His eyes as though bleeding
Tell his friend he still loves himas though doubting
Judas turns his face from God to a tree,
A length of rope wrapped as a snake
Around his wrists
And then the tree and then his throat years later, he will watch imitations
crawl along on their belly
Feet forgone or forgotten begging for another to commit another unforgivable.
the story of the earth is a
snaked tree, is a traitorous garden
they enter
Gethsemane Eden
alone. they emerge
doubled, one hanging
one slithering along
the ground.

Through the language of myth, legend, and religion, Qetsiah Joachim-Baggott's Gospels for the Tongue-Tied looks ahead to adulthood through the eyes of an autistic ungendered being womaned before God. Interweaving lived experience and the stories of Cassandra, Lilith, Eurydice, Delilah, and others, Joachim-Baggot blurs the lines between myth and reality, now and antiquity; the implications of expectation are timeless and raw. Gospels for the Tongue-Tied lives within and without the projects of gender and religion in an attempt to carve out a space for the self.

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Jun 12

AAAAAHHH!!!! ITS RELEASE DAY!!!
If you were holding off before there's no excuse now, please buy my book!!!

kith books @kithbooks.bsky.social · Jun 12

Gospels For the Tongue-Tied
by Qetsiah Baggott-Joachim

HAPPY RELEASE DAY, @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social!!!

get your copy now!
Print: kithbooks.com/shop/p/gospels
eBook: kithbooks.com/digital/p/gospels

4 1

Reposted by ✨ Q ✨

✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Jun 10

I am so so so so so excited for this!!! You should definitely come along, MJ and I never struggle for things to talk about, especially poetry themed, so it'll be a good time

Variant Literature @variantlit.bsky.social · Jun 10

Join MJ Gomez and Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott for Birdsong, Wildfires, and Faith: A Poetry Reading hosted by Variant Lit. Sunday, June 22 10 a.m. EST / 3 p.m. BST. Live on Zoom.

@bluejayverses.bsky.social @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social @kithbooks.bsky.social

Register:
us06web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Jun 10

I am so so so so so excited for this!!! You should definitely come along, MJ and I never struggle for things to talk about, especially poetry themed, so it'll be a good time

Variant Literature @variantlit.bsky.social · Jun 10

Join MJ Gomez and Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott for Birdsong, Wildfires, and Faith: A Poetry Reading hosted by Variant Lit. Sunday, June 22 10 a.m. EST / 3 p.m. BST. Live on Zoom.

@bluejayverses.bsky.social @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social @kithbooks.bsky.social

Register:
us06web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

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Reposted by ✨ Q ✨

kith books @kithbooks.bsky.social · Jun 7

I placed my trust in the hands of a stranger,
and told them that I was moulded from love.
- Curse for the Old Beloved
@iamgoingtocry.bsky.social

kithbooks.com/shop/p/gospels

kith in print

Through the language of myth, legend, and religion, Qetsi'ah Joachim-Baggott's Gospels for the Tongue-Tied looks ahead to adulthood through the eyes of an autistic ungendered being womaned before god....

kithbooks.com

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Reposted by ✨ Q ✨

kith books @kithbooks.bsky.social · Jun 7

Gospels for the Tongue-Tied lives within and without the projects of gender and religion in an attempt to carve out a space for the self.
@iamgoingtocry.bsky.social

Gospels For the Tongue-Tied
Qetsi'ah Baggott-Joachim

cover:
A beetle separated and reduced to its external anatomical components is rendered in a glowing light orange on a background of rich dark reddish brown. Text reading "GOSPELS FOR THE TONGUE-TIED" AND "QETSIAH JOACHIM-BAGGOT" appear at the top and bottom respectively in the same orange.

text:
MAYBE I’M NOT HERE AT ALL

Maybe I’m sitting in a stairwell at Birmingham New Street station
watching all the trains cruise in and out like ferry boats pulled by the ocean
pretending that the departures board above my head is something
that will tell me how to come home to you
again

Maybe now that I have left the concrete city the pigeons
hover above the powerlines looking around as though
they are bricks from the grey buildings in this city blinking
with the anticipatory wonder of a newborn calf fluttering their wings as though
free

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Reposted by ✨ Q ✨

kith books @kithbooks.bsky.social · May 31

we're having a bright book filled summer!
all four are available for pre-order at kithbooks.com/shop

@iamgoingtocry.bsky.social
@popelizbet.bsky.social

kith June/July releases
pre-orders are open now at kithbooks.com/shop

Jump Cut
Helen Gu
cover:
three red snappers hang to dry over a place setting on a table. their tails are obscured in orange smoke

Gospels for the Tongue-Tied
Quetsiah Joachim-Baggott
cover:
an anatomical breakdown diagram of a beetle

WOLFCANNON
C. J. Selwyn
a woman and a wolf face off across a table. in the demolished wall behind them, a wolf silhouette howls out the sun

Is My Chainsaw A Heart: 13 Centos
cover:
a green canoe floats at the end of a dock leading out into water surrounded by woods. a human heart hovers above.
Elizabeth R. McClellan

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · May 31

Go buy everyone's amazing books!! Also mine too!!

kith books @kithbooks.bsky.social · May 31

we're having a bright book filled summer!
all four are available for pre-order at kithbooks.com/shop

@iamgoingtocry.bsky.social
@popelizbet.bsky.social

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · May 15

Guys this is my book!!! It's been such a long process but it's finally available for preorder!!

kith books @kithbooks.bsky.social · May 15

Interweaving lived experience and the stories of Cassandra, Lilith, Eurydice, Delilah, and others, Qetsi'ah Joachim-Baggott blurs the lines between myth and reality, now and antiquity; the implications of expectation are timeless and raw.

@iamgoingtocry.bsky.social
link in reply

MAYBE I’M NOT HERE AT ALL

Maybe I’m sitting in a stairwell at Birmingham New Street station
watching all the trains cruise in and out like ferry boats pulled by the ocean
pretending that the departures board above my head is something
that will tell me how to come home to you
again

Maybe now that I have left the concrete city the pigeons
hover above the powerlines looking around as though
they are bricks from the grey buildings in this city blinking
with the anticipatory wonder of a newborn calf fluttering their wings as though
free

Maybe I’m lying on my back in an alleyway somewhere in London
watching the smog move in ink-swirls above my head like fresh milk in coffee pretending that I can see the constellations amongst all this nothing and
you lie and tell me you can see everything and I complain because you’re looking at
me

Maybe the only metaphor for love is blue bed sheets that weren’t mine
but are now they’ve had us both and our laughs inside them like old grass over the same two drops of dew every morning come rain or shine
and even in this simile I learn that I will always come back to your
side

Maybe now I’ve left the concrete city the pigeons
will learn to not call out to the shape of my retreating figure
lest they be disappointed when the shape turns to reveal someone new
standing at your side like a vine of ivy
maybe

now I don’t feed the pigeons with your birdseed
they will stop roosting in my chimney and cooing in the mornings
as I hide under my blues and pretend I don’t know what a dewdrop
is maybe now they don’t know you they will stop knowing at
all

Though Gospels for the Tongue-Tied assures its speaker, “your name is not the ocean / you cannot drown in it”, one cannot help but be submerged into the waters of Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott’s debut. Beginning in a blood-soaked ritual replete with visceral imagery, Gospels opens up into a tale that reckons with devotion, sexuality, and faith wrought from hardship. Like Jonah within the whale, these poems lead their reader through an unseen world made vibrant with tenderness and unique humor. Indeed, though this collection is Joachim-Baggott’s debut, its journey is most akin to a rebirth.
- MJ Gomez, author of Love Letters from a Burning Planet

In Gospels for the Tongue-Tied, Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott innovates through their use of form. Throughout several poems, Joachim-Baggott writes erasures with such freshness that each letter that gets erased leaves scalding heat in its wake; that there is always something waiting under the surface for you to discover.

In its variety, GOSPELS escapes the typical feeling of panic, and instead embraces fear as a symptom of truly living. In “BEWARE BEWARE BEWARE,” Joachim-Baggott writes, “WOULD YOU FEED THIS SOUL TO THE DEVIL//WOULD YOU FEED THESE HANDS TO GOD,” and then peels it back to say “WOULD YOU FEED THE DEVIL TO GOD.” Each poem in Gospels is urgent, each poem is wild, but each poem is mournful.

Gospels is written by pens inked with flames, haunting its readers with its brutally beautiful intentionality. From its many religious and literary allusions, to its devastatingly poignant language, to its elusive epigraphs—this is a collection of some of the greatest gospels.
- Aldrin Badiola, editor-in-chief of Artists from Maryland

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Feb 3

I wrote a new thing on my substack and realised I have never shared that here so open.substack.com/pub/qetsiaha... have this <333

January Essay Several Days Late

Or, Q tries something different

open.substack.com

✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Dec 31

I wrote an end of the year post on substack, so happy new year!

open.substack.com/pub/qetsiahand…

https://open.substack.com/pub/qetsiahand…

✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Nov 30

Of course I mean it's all of our faults for liking poetry, we're platforming workshops

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Nov 30

Someone "more of a statement than a question"-ed their work in the middle of them talking one time

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Nov 30

For the uneducated - or the non British - my profile picture is the icon macca pacca, the king of children's bedtime TV here. Also it's a live photo of me jumping up and down whenever something good happens

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Nov 30

What is their problem with words and also fun 😭

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Reposted by ✨ Q ✨

manywor(l)ds :: place @manyworlds.place · Nov 27

Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social is a queer disabled poet. Their debut collection, Gospels For The Tongue-Tied, is forthcoming with Kith Books.

Read portrait of a broken printer below!

manyworlds.place/issue-6/qets...

[editor’s note: the film is incomplete, watch with caution]

the printer is broken
oh no. it only gives me washed out candids of someone
else’s smile.
occasionally some paper bones,
a rotten wisdom tooth hanging from
a flesh thread in a red mouth.
it’s all aquamarine and violet stained, i’ve replaced the
ink seven times now.
my printer keeps crying on my photos.
i think it’s grieving. in the night it
cries itself to sleep. in the morning
there are pictures of [garbled, incoherent] clinging to my
coffee machine.
oh no. i tried to print out an essay yesterday,
but i just got a page of someone asking me to

[editor’s note: the film cuts out here, no footage available for 30s. Don’t turn your screens off]

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Nov 27

If you'd like to know my reaction to this news, I jumped up and down like a crazy person, on the side of the road. Totally thrilled!!!!!

manywor(l)ds :: place @manyworlds.place · Nov 27

join us in celebrating our 2024 pushcart nominees:

Kai Minosh Pyle @greatlakesqueer.bsky.social
Robin Gow
nat raum @gr8earlofhell.bsky.social
Avra Margariti @avramargariti.bsky.social
Caiti Quatmann @caititalks.bsky.social
Qetsi'ah Joachim-Baggott @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social

Kai Minosh Pyle, TRANS NDN ARCHIVE
Robin Gow, Ziphius
nat raum, pov: a commenter on your r/ptsdhumor meme has just alerted you that you have tinnitus
Avra Margariti, Games Girls Play
Caiti Quatmann, Greetings from Glacier National Park
Qetsi’ah Joachim-Baggott, portrait of a broken printer

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manywor(l)ds :: place @manyworlds.place · Nov 27

join us in celebrating our 2024 pushcart nominees:

Kai Minosh Pyle @greatlakesqueer.bsky.social
Robin Gow
nat raum @gr8earlofhell.bsky.social
Avra Margariti @avramargariti.bsky.social
Caiti Quatmann @caititalks.bsky.social
Qetsi'ah Joachim-Baggott @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social

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✨ Q ✨ @iamgoingtocry.bsky.social · Nov 18

9am is too early for a lecture
Especially when I feel ill