December 2015 Supercat @AlinaMeridon

I’m away for a few days, so a slightly premature Happy New Year!

I’m not a great believer in resolutions, but this year there is an urgent need to both make and keep them, so please wish me luck in improving my health and fitness – just as I wish the world to become a healthier and fitter place.

No news on the publishing front, and it has been a quiet month over at Alina Meridon, apart from a couple more episodes of Supergirl and Mistress X. The new Supergirl TV series with Melissa Benoist is excellent, although not as tightly and tensely plotted and edited as, say, Smallville or Daredevil, but the relationship between Kara and her boss Cat (Calista Flockhart) has led to some very entertaining shipping on Tumblr under the tag Supercat. Here’s a little contribution from me:

said Cat to young Kara, “Take off your specs
and show me your naked face
Too long you have hidden, enough’s enough,
now give me the girl from space”

“Ms Grant, you’re mistaken,” poor Kara said
“I’m merely a girl from Earth
what little resemblance you may have glimpsed
is an accident of birth”

but Cat smiled her smile of deadly intent
“I will see your face, my dear
and whether or not my suspicions are proved
I’ll see a lot more, no fear”

her fingers instilled with confident strength
she teased the pink cotton apart
revealing a trembling superhero
with an ‘S’ protecting her heart

“Ms Grant,” whispered Kara – “It’s ‘Cat’” said Ms Grant
“though ‘Mistress’ will work just as well
your secret is safe, my beautiful girl
so trust me, I never will tell”

If you wish, you can add an Owl and the Pussycat chorus to each verse, e.g.:

but Cat smiled her smile of deadly intent
“I will see your face, my dear
and whether or not my suspicions are proved
I’ll see a lot more, no fear
no fear, no fear!
I’ll see a lot more, no fear”

In a way, it makes my saga of Supergirl and Mistress X seem rather irrelevant, but I still like the dynamic of hero-and-supervillain, and fan fiction’s a tricky thing. I have had brushes with it in the past, having written something about Xena: Warrior Princess once, and my novel Kings of Infinite Space was originally half-intended one day to be the third volume in a trilogy, where the second volume was set in the Star Trek universe. But the trouble with fan fiction is that you never have control over the universe in which your story is set. There’s always danger that the next episode of the series will invalidate your unofficial contribution.

So I don’t have any enthusiasm for shipping. Much as I love the idea of Supercat, I can’t really see a major TV network allowing a bisexual Supergirl to be anything more than a possibility. The romance of Supergirl and Mistress X is separate from all this – set in a parallel universe, perhaps.

Global Seesaw

Pharaoh’s Daughter by Freedom Stones: “This piece comes to you from Ghana where it was lovingly handmade by survivors of human trafficking.”

During an internet search for handmade paper for a Christmas present this year, I stumbled across Love Calcutta Arts (“Love Calcutta Arts has arisen out of a desire to break the cycle of prostitution by bringing freedom to young girls who are otherwise at risk of abuse.”) which took me to Global Seesaw (“All our manufacturing partners are social enterprises who reinvest their products and measure success in terms of human lives changed rather than pure profit.”).

beauty emergent
free the phoenix spirit soars
from a shattered life

I ordered a variety of soaps, notebooks, Christmas cards and the beautiful Pharaoh’s Daughter necklace shown here. Despite this being the 10th December, everything was dispatched the same day and delivery was very quick. All in all, a very satisfying way to do Christmas shopping…

Posts

• Dressing as a Man, Supergirl and Mistress X ☆ ☆ Christmas Special! ☆ ☆
• this femininity I do detest, a body-swap villanelle: Mistress X dislikes being Supergirl
• on the ramparts of beauty – dreams of bland perfection, round-up of December’s haiku

November 2015 Supergirl and Lilith @AlinaMeridon

My editor seems happier with Version 2 of I Like It Hard, although there are still a few kinks to iron out – although it wouldn’t be the same book if all the kink was ironed out…

Supergirl

I’m not a comic book fan, mainly because they’re nowhere near as popular in Britain as they are in the States. Growing up, I knew Superman and Supergirl from the films; Batman and Wonder Woman from TV; Spiderman and others from cartoons. My occasional contact with comic books was therefore confusing and dissatisfying.

I loved the Superman films – the first three, anyway. I wanted to love the Supergirl film; it had its good points, but was awful too.

But the Supergirl film was hamstrung by the essential question of Who is Supergirl? Not until the excellent Smallville did Kara escape her cousin’s shadow – and since Smallville was emphatically not about Superman, it couldn’t afford to give us more than a few glimpses of Supergirl.

When I decided to write about Supergirl last year for National Poetry Writing Month (April 2014), I wanted to pull her out of Superman’s shadow. I spent a month imagining her in different tragic and heroic roles; some funny, some sad, some sexy, some angry.

Ultimately she is a far more interesting person than Superman. Kal had an idyllic childhood, and as an adult he must conceal his true self from all but a few. Kara has lost everything, her planet gone, her family gone – all save Kal, who does not share that traumatic memory.

even when it fell
Krypton was beautiful
my mother wore red

moment of destruction
still behind my eyelids
photographic memory

One of the poems was A hero true, which had the villainous Mistress X hold a city to ransom, demanding that Supergirl submit to her erotic demands…

I like a good lesbian romance, and the story of Supergirl and Mistress X has grown into an epic saga – there are currently twenty poems in the saga. Maybe there will be more.

where else can I sleep
except in a villain’s arms?
she’s lined with silver

she is the storm and I her eye

Lilith

I grow havoc-wings and mordant feet

That’s a line from The Passion of Lilith by Pamela White Hadas, an extraordinary poem that I love for its subject as well as the vivid poetry. I chose that line because it echoes the 3800-year-old relief shown here. Hadas’s Lilith is ‘the first liberated woman… Adam would like Lilith to lie beneath him in the sexual act, and to be subservient in every way; Lilith naturally has other ideas.’

which of us, Adam or Lilith, keeps a promised land?
He let me leave, found Eve, and even Genesis
left me out,
but he couldn’t forget

Gorgeous and passionate… Here’s a little something by me:

lilith wears the night
passion like fire-splintered ice
too bright for eden

Lilith and succubi have been on my mind this month because I have started reading Down Where The Blue Violet Beauties Bloom, the first book in Jacquotte Fox Kline’s new fantasy trilogy Down Deep Inside about an angel who falls from Heaven into a city of succubi ruled over by the goddess Aphrodite. I couldn’t resist asking the author some questions, and her answers turned into a guest post.

Posts

• Beneath the Cooling Sun, a young Mistress X has superpowers
• Just X Found, X finds a crystal…
• That Shattering Night, … and gives it to Kara
• Who is Supergirl, musing on Supergirl as hero
• The sin of pride, Lilith is less than impressed with Adam
• but who will worship you, a scornful villanelle
• the banquet before her, a cinquain – about a succubus, perhaps
• A succubus sat on a rock, limerick poem about an insatiable succubus
• Goddesses of Love, Lust and Liberty, talking about mythology with Jacquotte Fox Kline
• shadows in Earthlight – a carvery of hearts, November’s round-up of haiku