Category: Essay

a breakneck, yet-always foregone conclusion

On By ©️K.T. 2025In america, Autocracy, Capitalism, Essay, Fascism, inequality, lies, nationalism, neo-liberalism, neoliberalism, patriotism, threshold, U.S. Politics, U.S. PresidentLeave a comment

The rapidity with which this Trump administration moves — for those who had accepted incremental change, bureaucratic molasses and the long arc of justice as just par-for-the-course of the ‘democratic’ process and social progression in the US — those falsehoods and everything else that has been revealed in these last two months — is both mockery and insult added to our collective American (and global) actual injuries.

Capitalism and Neoliberalism paved the road for — and then engineered and constructed the super highway to, oligarchal fascism.

Continue reading “a breakneck, yet-always foregone conclusion” →

The time is NOW for applied anti-fascist actions of resistance and desistance and acts of courage —firstly, by elected and sworn state and local leadership

On By ©️K.T. 2025In america, American Indian Movement, anti-fascism, anti-zionism, antifa, Authoritarian, Autocracy, balkanization, Capitalism, Chicago, City of Chicago, Climate Chaos, Climate Collapse, Crone, Crone Consciousness, Earth, Earth hospice, Earthling, earthlings, ecocide, economics, empire, Essay, Fascism, Gaza, Genocide, kill lists, National Guard, nationalism, Nazism, neo-liberalism, Nuclear Weapons, Palestine, planetary hospice, Poem, poetry, Regime, Resistance, Revolution, State of Illinois, State of the Union, Tax Resistance, Tax Resistor, threshold, U.S. Federal Government, U.S. Politics, U.S. President, United States of America, WarLeave a comment

political & ideological opposition is meaningless now

Billionaire JB Pritzker, the current Governor of the State of Illinois in an annual constitutionally mandated “State Of The State” address of February 19, 2025, questioned the near and long-term State of the Union — of the United States of America,

the relevant paragraphs are excerpted below with a link to the full transcript:

Continue reading “The time is NOW for applied anti-fascist actions of resistance and desistance and acts of courage —firstly, by elected and sworn state and local leadership” →
Featured

Dickensian Dollar Store Christmas

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Capitalism, Chicago, Christmas, Cities, City of Chicago, december, Essay, from the inner city to outer rural, Gold, inner city, kinship, Lent, Portage Park, UrbanLeave a comment

a version of this essay was first published December 8, 2015

“Christmas is coming, 
the goose is getting fat, 
please put a penny in the old man's hat, 
if you haven't got a penny, 
then, a half-penny will do, 
if you haven't got a half-penny, 
then God bless you.”

I went to the nearest Dollar Store to buy old-fashioned, stringy, silver tinsel for our christmas tree.

All that glitters is not silver or gold, is never ever golden, whether you buy your pretty ornaments or wrapping paper for a buck – or two at Dollar Tree, Walmart, Target, Macy’s or Saks for $5, $10, $30 or $50. The only difference is the retailer’s profit margin — very rarely is there a difference in quality when it comes to seasonal items, disposable items and sundries.

The season of peace and beauty feels very false once you know and remember to never forget that all those beautiful ornaments and decorations adorning almost every American home, restaurant or holiday venue are made by women, children, or men in sweatshops who are breathing in lead dust, paint fumes, plastic glitter, chemicals and pigments often for less than $30 per 12-hour shift; all that beautiful crap then warehoused, shipped, stocked and sold by non-living-wage, multi-job workers in the U.S.

Yet, while I’m there roaming the aisles or in the long line to check-out, I feel an overwhelming sense of community with my fellow city dwellers — the shoppers, the store’s workers and with all the workers of the World — particularly those in Yiwu, Zhezhang, China who are mass-producing a vast majority of all of this shit.

silver tinsel, aka Icicles,
ironically & hilariously,
still made in the USA!

I also feel an overwhelming revulsion of the systems of ‘growth’ and development: capitalism, consumerism, and human and natural resource “management” which are uniquely undeniable in the fluorescent, depressive uniformity of the minimally staffed chaos found in a busy, urban dollar store,

Continue reading “Dickensian Dollar Store Christmas” →

waiting for the bough to break

On By ©️K.T. 2025In author, autobiographical, crone chronicles, death and other endings, december, dirt road chronicles, earthlings, endings, Essay, flora, Gaza, Genocide, grief, kin, Life and Death, liminality, mortality, Palestine, plant beings, Reverence, threshold, time, Tree, Trees, writerLeave a comment

i am waiting for the bough to break — or, to be severed by proxy at my behest.

earlier this week on my daily walk-about, i noticed that a primary limb, the major artery, on a nearly 80’ tall and likely nearing 100 years-old, elm tree on the land i occupy, had cleaved and that the fracture was migrating down into the trunk — and dangerously so.

i don’t know the cause: if it was the abrupt shift in temperature to freezing here in southwest Michigan — or, if the tree was stressed from a standing-water-wet spring followed by a very dry summer, or if “it” is simply at the end of their life — all the elms here had unusually held onto an abundance of their prolific leaves until the fourth week of November.

no matter.

the matters:

the massive limb of the elm stretches high and precariously over the old barn, and depending on the wind direction, there’s a chance if it falls, it could clip the back of my house or take the whole tree down with it.

i await the tree surgery & removal crew. i am at their and the northerly and westerly gusts’ mercy.

in the meantime, i have also been wrestling with the possible choice of whether to have the crew amputate just the cleaved limbs — if the tree is in fact salvageable — or, to remove the entire tree at once instead of forestalling the inevitable.

Continue reading “waiting for the bough to break” →

contemplating intent, consent, kill lists and ceasefire: deer hunting season, regular firearm, November 15 – 30, 2024 Michigan, U.S.

On By ©️K.T. 2025In agraria, america, Animals, anthropocene, autumn, Ceasefire, Crone, crone chronicles, Crone Consciousness, Cronehood, Death, deer, deer hunting, Earth hospice, Earthling, earthlings, ecocide, Essay, fauna, Gaza, Genocide, holocaust, hunters, hunting, hunting season, Hylic, kin, kinship, Life and Death, liminality, limineen, Manifest Destiny, November, outer rural, Palestine, Philosophy, planetary hospice, Politics, Psychic, ruralia, the accidental seeker & intentional opiner, the old gods, Tradition As Violence, Tradition Is Violence, ZionismLeave a comment

“The assumption that animals are without rights and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality.”

Arthur Schopenhauer.

a white-tailed deer drinks from a bird bath,
which was presumed to be of exclusive use of songbirds — especially, eastern bluebirds,
on the land the author occupies
Halloween 2024
“all treatery, no trickery”

Regular firearm, deer hunting season began yesterday in Michigan, United States of America, and the crack of rifles and the blast of shotguns destroy both peace and life.

There is some version of a legalized, defined kill list or belated, legalized “protection list” for nearly every non-human animal being population on Earth. And, for human animal being populations on Earth too.

What defines murder for human beings, of the human animal body?

INTENT.

All Hunting is INTENT – intent to kill.

All animal “livestock” agriculture is INTENT — intent to kill for profit.

Genocide is INTENT.

Continue reading “contemplating intent, consent, kill lists and ceasefire: deer hunting season, regular firearm, November 15 – 30, 2024 Michigan, U.S.” →

Brunching Whilst the New Rome Burns

On By ©️K.T. 2025In betrayal, democrats, Essay, fuck the rich, liberals, neo-liberalism, neoliberalism, neoliberals, Poem, poetry, Politics, Presidential Election, U.S. Elections, U.S. PoliticsLeave a comment

oh, these [neo]liberals
they love to be seen,
what’s the point of excess everything
if you ain’t seen by The Peers™️ or The Poors™️

they tell us we are unfortunates or degenerates, ambitionless, uneducated, lazy: we, mere mothers, workers, poors, caregivers, included with “the deplorables” — lumped together in the unmelting trash pot of America

“our” consumption has created islands of plastic in the Pacific ocean
and the dunes of clothing in the Chilean desert
our thoughtless, lowbrow Walmart and Target tastes,
our holiday shopping, and aspirational Disney World, Pigeon Forge, or Vegas vacations — our rare and short-lived “joy” until the credit card is full and the bill arrives / we don’t get to savor the memories — our joy quickly mutates into anxiety, over-time hours, debt, pain

whilst every single day — is their windfall, every day is their holiday,

their screens open to the financial page bookmarks first thing in the morning followed by local crime, never white-collared, though — never to poverty, hunger, oppression, genocide:

Continue reading “Brunching Whilst the New Rome Burns” →

ATTN: AI Data/Content Trawler [or, Human Reader]:

On By ©️K.T. 2025In AI, author, Copyright, Essay, film, Neologism, photograph, photography, Poem, poetry, Words, writer, WritingLeave a comment

No part of the original writing, photos or any other content on this website aka the “blog” titled “The Limineen” or formerly known as the “The Velveteen Poet” or “The Accidental Seeker & Intentional Opiner” may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever for the purpose or intention to train artificial intelligence [AI] technologies, systems or language models;

additionally, all writing, photographs, uploads, screenshots, video files, audio files, or artworks are the sole copyright of the author, or were published with explicit or implicit permission,

— unless otherwise noted, linked or attributed;

the author expressly reserves all rights to the original content and works published on this website and all published works anywhere online including social media, and reserves rights from reuse without permission and attribution — and from any text and data mining exception laws.

*this post was inspired by Penguin Random House Books newly updated standard copyright page as reported by The Verge.

Continue reading “ATTN: AI Data/Content Trawler [or, Human Reader]:” →

a reader’s digest *almost-worthy* story

On By ©️K.T. 2025In author, biographical, childhood, crone chronicles, Cronehood, Essay, exposition, Life and Death, mortality, Prose, Survival, threshold, writer, WritingLeave a comment

as i sit here on my deck on a beautiful, late August, Sunday morning in rural southwest Michigan reading an article about surviving a bear attack at Signal Mountain in Yellowstone in May 2024,

i am reminded that

one of my very favorite things as a kid was to visit my great grandmother and to sit in her rocking and folding lawn chair, all by myself on the tiny porch — of her modest, peach-colored stucco bungalow at 2229 West Oakdale Avenue in Chicago — because we didn’t have a porch, only a stoop at CHA’s Julia C. Lathrop Homes where i lived as a child (privacy, peace and quiet were rare there) and comb through her Reader’s Digest magazine collection for stories of wilderness experiences and encounters with wildlife — especially the ones with predators: sometimes, not everyone survived in those excerpted stories /

but the intense desire to experience the outdoors that those stories inspired in me was almost entirely extinguished when i went, *with zero experience* on a three day/two night camping-canoe trip along the Fox River for our 8th grade class graduation trip; me and another 13 year-old female classmate were paired together in a canoe in a group of 5-6 canoes / i went [un]prepared with a borrowed, indoor Barbie slumber party sleeping bag from one friend and my best friend Jill’s dad’s old army reservist mess kit — everything stuffed into a single, tripled black garbage bag to keep my “gear” dry in case we tipped and went into the water/ Jill couldn’t go herself because that winter she was suddenly stricken with Raynaud’s Syndrome and was quite sick from another, yet-undiagnosed autoimmune disease /

my classmates and i slept outside on the ground without a tent and woke covered dew and very cold both mornings (while the adults occupied two very dry and warm pup tents) // we peed (and presumably, some of us also pooped) into holes dug in the ground within earshot of our 13 & 14 year old [boy] classmates and male teachers // the only other girl on the trip got her period the first night and had to use a sock as a menstrual pad because none of the male teachers thought to come prepared in event for that routine bodily function — and apparently, none of our mothers suggested this to us or to them — or planned for it either //

around the campfire the first night, which was a Friday, our teachers told us in a very serious manner that the camp in the film Friday the 13th — “Camp Crystal Lake” — was actually based on a true story at nearby youth camp— we had, in fact, passed a road sign for “Crystal Lake” en route; while, i had not yet seen the film — but the others filled me in in great detail — and it no longer felt good or safe to be on the trip with them — even after the teachers’ retractions and promises that they were “just joking”.

Continue reading “a reader’s digest *almost-worthy* story” →

come back, come back

On By ©️K.T. 2025In agraria, aviary, birds, bucolia, crone chronicles, dirt road chronicles, Essay, goodbye city life, hummingbird, Kahlo, Lament, ornithology, poemo, ruralia, Spiritive, Spirrative, wildlifeLeave a comment
hummingbirds where have you gone?
ADDENDUM: the hummingbirds did come back, and as of September 8, 2024 10:00 AM EDT, they are still here.

mid-late april, optimistic
early may, expectant
mid may, consternation

meticulously,
i sanitize the vessels,
bases and perches
soaking and fastidiously brushing the red and yellow flower parts to clean them of all gunk and lodged debris
i employ two, simple, pinched-waist, glass hummingbird feeders //
there are more beautiful, ornamental, more expensive or cheaper feeders available,
but this design functions best/ i am a seven year veteran of hummingbird joy.

age-old recipe for hummingbird feeder nectar:

1 part pure cane sugar.

PURE. CANE. SUGAR.

to

4 parts water.

the end.

not beet sugar, not organic sugar,
nor turbinado, nor raw, never brown sugar

this so very important – other sugars are too susceptible to mold, to bacteria, or contain too much iron in the form of molasses.

pure, white, refined and granulated cane sugar, chemically and nutritionally, most closely approximates natural flower nectar

never ever, use store-bought nectar mix* or pre-mix*;
*and when in a store that sells that toxic shit, bury the packets or hide the bottles behind other merchandise on the shelf — just as when i spot Clinton, Kissinger, Amy Schumer, Dubya, or Sheryl Sandberg non-fiction fictions on the shelf at bookstores or big box stores — i flip that tripe backwards and upside down
so, again:

age-old recipe for hummingbird feeder nectar:

1 part cane sugar

to

4 parts fresh water,

i use pristine well water, here: i am so very fortunate: no chlorine, no fluoride just elements and minerals, no water treatment except for a sediment filter

these two simple ingredients vigorously shaken together, not stirred/
just like my homemade margarita with ice
in the same one-quart glass mason jar

i check the feeders
throughout the day
i obsess, i pray, in my own way

first incantation songs
then lamentation songs

a carpenter bee tricks my ear while i am on my knees digging in the garden

was that her? is she back? are they back?

no, that wasn’t;
no, they’re not.

i google:

“do hummingbirds return to the same summer nesting and feeding grounds each year?”
&
“how long do hummingbirds live?

Continue reading “come back, come back” →

Easter

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Crone, Crone Consciousness, Cronehood, Easter, Essay, exposition, Gnosis, Mother, Motherhood, OuroborosLeave a comment

a version of this foto essay was first published

April 2019

Spring is life.

A mother rabbit birthed at least three bunnies in a niche of the house – enclosed on three sides with only a northern mossy exposure – mostly safe and hidden from owls, hawks and coyotes. They nibble on young dandelion and clover leaves. They are joy.

My one and only baby’s very first Easter and Spring. A surprise of daffodils under a white oak tree at our first house and home on Grace Street in Chicago. Mother, son, full of grace.

I don’t know where the stuffed white rabbit with pink, acrylic eyes and pink, satin ears came from — exactly. But I’ve had it forever, before memory, so I pretend that it was presented to the baby girl born in late October, just before Halloween. Or gifted to the baby girl on her first Easter. Or won for the toddler girl at her first carnival.

Before I was a mother to a boy, I — an only child — was a teenaged auntie to a beautiful boy named +Tony+ [Giovanni Anthony Martinez] born in Spring 1986. I learned from him that I might become a mother to a son one day even though I was sure I was meant only to be a mother to a daughter. And that, was a wonderful revelation.

Continue reading “Easter” →

i want to tell you, talk with you, about things, but i can’t, we can’t | we can only cry: CEASEFIRE, FREE PALESTINE! Rafah!

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Essay, Genocide, Land Back, Liberation, Life and Death, Palestine, Prose, ZionismLeave a comment

i want to share things like:

this morning, i accidentally swiped my cosmetic brush across the 4 toned mineral highlight powder instead of translucent powder — and i now look like a 70s disco queen (especially with bed hair) or Ziggy Stardust (it’s too much to rewash my face and i’m just gonna look like this all day)

and, that i had another Big Dream (Jungian) early this morning before Sun’s rise — it was powerful and unnerving; are you dreaming too? have you had any Big Dreams?

and, that after buying myself 5 (actually 7) houseplant babies for the Ides of February, bringing the total upwards of 50 plants, my house is still not even close to being filled — so how can i be called a “plant lady”?

and that a crow died here and i performed some rites over and left gifts upon, their dear remains;

Continue reading “i want to tell you, talk with you, about things, but i can’t, we can’t | we can only cry: CEASEFIRE, FREE PALESTINE! Rafah!” →

Degrowth or die-out: an imperative for the insatiable species.

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Capitalism, Climate Chaos, Climate Collapse, Earth hospice, Earthling, earthlings, ecocide, Essay, ki, kin, kinship, Lament, Lamentations, Land Back, planetary hospice, Poem, Sixth Mass ExtinctionLeave a comment

this informal essay was inspired by Jeff Gibbs’ statement posted February 6, 2024;

I publish this, as per — to be publicly accountable and on record.

Development is development is development. All development damages the remaining already profoundly fragmented wilderness-ish habitat no matter what kind of development it is — no matter the seemingly innocuous or good intent: a paved bike path through forest, a solar array in the desert, an ayahuasca retreat center on a river in northern Illinois, a new organic farm.

“If you build it, they will come.” And then never stop coming and building.

We must stop destroying land to build more of anything — we must begin to reclaim and return land to nature and welcome, encourage, champion and personally embody the practices of degrowth.

An example of behavior:

“You should build a little rental cottage on your land over there for supplemental income and to sustain yourself through your golden years.”

– no, i will not build anything there ever — that’s where i set out the salt licks for the deer – by the three apple trees; no, that area is too near to where the blue racer lays her eggs every summer; no! as tempting as that false security is, i will live modestly and reject improvements for improvement’s sake — and embrace flaws and maintenance, and do with what i have — or without. this land is not mine; i merely temporarily co-occupy and humbly and gratefully tend and share this land.

also, there are no more golden years — to quote Beatrix Kiddo, “Bitch, you don’t have a future” — do you understand the science, the projections? let me help you to, i want to.

An opposite example of behavior:

Continue reading “Degrowth or die-out: an imperative for the insatiable species.” →

song[s] of my self: epigenetic lamentations

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Crone, Crone Consciousness, Epigenetic, Essay, Finnish, Knowledge, Lament, Lamentations, poet, poetryLeave a comment

During the summer of 2017 – a time of significant change in my life – including the rupture of my marriage, an upcoming “milestone” birthday, and a relocation to a quiet rural place with dark skies and an abundance of fauna and flora — I literally heard myself: I had unconsciously begun a meditative practice of singing or humming verses and melodies of sorrow, wonder, gratitude — or simply, of the mundane. They were autonomic and presumably original, lamentations.

then, serendipitously, I retroactively encountered a May 2017 piece published in Yes! magazine about the revival and history of “lament singing” in Finland.

To find that I was unconsciously, but actually, participating in a Finnish tradition that I had never experienced or even heard of — but that was somehow still within in me — in some cellular, trans-generational or ancestral place — felt like a bridge to my lineage — to all my unknown women-kin.

The lyrics and tunes occurred spontaneously over several months, and I often automatically repeated the same one over and over while working, cleaning, cooking, gardening, walking or driving. I sung or hummed them mostly while alone, but sometimes they would emerge aloud in public places — and I didn’t even realize that I was in song or know how long I had been doing it.

People who laugh, cry, sing and talk to themselves aloud in the street are not “crazy” — we are comforting, raging, celebrating, mocking and mourning ourselves, our lives, our experiences and the world.

Continue reading “song[s] of my self: epigenetic lamentations” →

Sentience & the exclusive velveteening of pets and familiar animals

On By ©️K.T. 2025In Animals, Earthling, earthlings, Essay, ki, kin, Narrative, Prose, velveteenLeave a comment

My dog, Woody, wakes up and wants breakfast – not just breakfast, but a very expensive kibble prepared with gravy and a quarter cup of warmed pumpkin (his dinner is more elaborate – it’s offered like a buffet plate or poke bowl). He eats, goes outside to do his business and investigate a little, comes back inside, and stops and sits on the rug to think, “Where is my baby?”

He goes around the house on a search for it, and comes back with a flying squirrel toy, ready to play. He bumps the laptop off my thighs several times to engage me, and we play. Later, he lets me know he’d like to go outside; we head to the basement, but he doesn’t want to wear his coat – he knows dogs don’t wear coats, and he hides behind the full clotheslines; we come to an agreement, and he permits me to put the coat on him.

We walk, but I don’t want to go to the park, so we walk through the neighborhoods; but when Woody gets to an arterial street which borders the park, he stops, looks, then looks at me, and pulls, to suggest that we should turn south right there and go to the park – because he’s actually in the mood for the park.

Woody Guthrie & the Twin Sycamores of Portage Park, Chicago 2016

When we finally arrive home after our very long walk, i dry his paws and legs one by one and also his undercarriage; he kisses my face in an annoyed gratitude; then, he lets me know he wants to be close – he has two comfy dog beds and my son’s vacant bed, but he wants to be near – and climbs into a deep club chair made for one – onto my lap – he weighs 65 lbs.

Continue reading “Sentience & the exclusive velveteening of pets and familiar animals” →