Happy corgi, sad corgi.

The armadillo of sadness arrives.

Dear Identity Theory Readers,

Today we published three poems by Alina Stefanescu. And a disgruntled bunny cartoon.

It was otherwise a slow week because we finally got around to moving our website to a new server on Monday and wanted to give it a chance to settle in to its new digs.

The Armadillo of Sadness Arrives During Football Season

Alina Stefanescu’s poems are, of course, brilliant beyond comprehension.

Here’s “The First Year of Tinnitus” for you:

And here’s a clip from “Five Arguments with Czeslaw about ‘Self-Image’”:

The self imagines itself in the selfless
selfie. Allege it all to be loved, to swell the curve
in the beloved's path as his eyes shut the stanza.
Fellow sleepless ones, I think we could run forever
and never stop feeling it. Needle the verb
to restore what is wounded,
what is infected once existed.

Read all three poems by Alina Stefanescu.

Newsletter Exclusive: Corgi Poems

We’ve been known to ask people on Twitter to send us poems to read to our corgi. Thus, Identity Theory reader Fatima Zahra sent us her poems about corgis, noting that she “definitely did not write all of these poems within half an hour of waking up. Nope.”

Anyway, we hope her poems bring you cheer:

ODE TO CORGIS OUR SAVIORS

flapping
tongue, a sign
Of
eternal wisdom.

Nacho pair
embeds
named
ears.

midnight olives
pasted
two voids
nostrils

A good boy, with a
fluffy little
Tail
shiny marbles for
eyes.

Those who
mock its
greatness
are destined to fall

Corgis (Two haiku)

1. satin-like brown coat
snow scattered down the middle
I yell, call it cuuuuute

2. jiggling like jelly
it runs, puts miniscule
paws into my hands.

-Fatima Zahra

Don’t Look at the Bunny

Your weekly cartoon from Alan Michael Parker:

Rejection is a Dead Horse

Meh. Kinda over talking about rejection this week. I’m on a break from that discourse.

Here’s our poetry editor Danielle Rose’s take:

Sylvia Plath, who sounds like she would have felt right at home with social media, wrote in her diary, “Winning or losing an argument, receiving an acceptance or rejection, is no proof of the validity or value of personal identity. One may be wrong, mistaken, or a poor craftsman, or just ignorant—but this is no indication of the true worth of one’s total human identity: past, present & future!”

Isaac Asimov urges writers to persist. Sophie Mackintosh talks about accepting rejection and practicing self-compassion.

What I mean is that rejection sucks. I know. I get rejected a lot. So just like, do whatever you need to do. Keep a list of enemies, make yourself tea, go for a run, Tweet vaguely encouraging platitudes, lose your keys, get mad at the neighbors, go to the movies, steal candy from a baby, whatever. Do what you need to do. We all do.

Please note that Identity Theory does not officially endorse stealing candy from babies after receiving our rejection letter. We’re not ready for a week of “Identity Theory told me to steal candy from babies” discourse.

But we do endorse this sign at Public Works, my local coffee shop:

Note: We would totally be up for ditching our rejection letter and sending happy corgi/sad corgi responses to indicate our accept/reject decisions, but we can’t find any sad corgi photos. Maybe we’ll use the angry bunny cartoon instead.

Just Some Stuff to Include at the End of the Newsletter in Case Anyone’s Still Reading and Feels Like Clicking on Something Else

• For better or worse, we’re up to 11.2k Twitter followers. Hopefully (or not) you’re keeping up with us there.

• Thanks again to those who have donated and/or opted to send paid submissions. Our new website hosting situation is much better because of you.

• If you’re ditching Twitter (or even if you’re not), follow us on Instagram.

Almost Forgot to Include a Corgi Pic

Here’s an old one of him enjoying a puppuccino. Like the song says, we were so much older then, we’re younger than that now:

Keep writing or stop writing or maybe just go outside,

Matt Borondy
EIC
Identity Theory