This piece was originally published in the 13th issue of So It Goes, the Kurt Vonnegut Museum’s literary journal. The theme was “A Labor of Love. If you want a hard copy or to read more insights on how people approach labor, or just support the museum, you can buy a copy here: https://www.vonnegutlibrary.org/so-it-goes/

What I would really like though, is if you read the piece and then visited Brightlane Learning here: https://brightlanelearning.org/

Read about them and the work they do. You might have time, talent, or other resources you’d like to give them. I’m a volunteer tutor with them. One hour a week is dedicated to kids impacted by homelessness. I have tried to explain before what it has meant to me, and the best I’ve been able to do is this.

This piece belongs to the KVLM journal. But it belongs to Brightlane too. And most importantly, it’s a letter of love for my kids.

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Six Moments with Children at Indianapolis Shelters

By Keira Perkins

1.         It’s 2018 and I’ve started volunteering with kids experiencing homelessness. I’m always happiest when I’ve been put to work, but I fear I’ve made a mistake. I don’t know what I am doing.  

“I hate that bird,” says my student, darkly and with all the contempt a six-year-old can muster.

He’s pointing at the swallow tattoo on my foot. So far, he hates the books I’ve suggested. He hates school. He hates me. He hates everything.

“I hate it.” he says again, and he mimes like he is going to stab my foot with his pencil.

“Let’s not do that. The bird didn’t do anything bad to you.”  I say as I take the pencil and offer him a crayon.

I am in over my head, and we both know it, but I have a Midwestern work ethic. I am incapable of quitting.

We work on the alphabet and counting to twenty and I really doubt my ability to teach as the weeks go by. I keep trying and he eventually decides that he likes me, just a little bit.

Then one day he’s gone and my heart breaks, just a little bit.

2.         My student is hunched up in her seat, fidgeting with her pencil and refusing to look at me. I understand. I am exhausted and feeling defeated with so many things too. I’m here though because I promised and there’s work to do.

I tell her when I have feelings that are too big for my body, sometimes I push them into safe places until I feel better. I’ve been reading about emotional health and child development, and I am desperately hoping this works.

She doesn’t believe me, so I show her, placing my hands flat against a painted concrete wall, one foot ahead and one behind.

“Push, push, push!” I say and I push as hard as I can.

She’s eight, which is an age where she may join me pushing, or she may let me be an idiot alone, trying to push down a wall.

I’m lucky though and she trusts me just enough, “Push, push PUSH!”

Then she is giggling and willing to try her homework. I let her wear my cardigan because we are in a drafty basement, and she is cold. I don’t tell her I’m cold too.

I see her a few more times, and then never again.

3.         We’re at an emergency shelter because this is where I’m needed tonight. She’s wary of me and I don’t blame her. I am a stranger, and this room is dreary and smells like hot dog water.  I don’t know what her last twenty-four hours have looked like, but they can’t have been easy if she’s here. We are reading a book about penguins and scientists. I tell her I’m a scientist too, but I don’t study penguins. Suddenly the book is real to her.

“Do you think I can be a penguin scientist?” she asks me shyly.

“Yes,” I tell her, “You have to study really hard, but you can do that.”

“I can be a penguin scientist and come back here and be the teacher?” Her voice is hopeful now, stronger.

“Yes,” I say it more firmly, like there is no other truer thing in the world, “Yes, you can do that.”

She smiles for the first time, and I see an entire new world open behind her eyes. We keep reading about penguins.

It is the first and last time we will ever meet. 

4.         She’s the cleverest kindergartner I’ve ever known, and math is her favorite game. She wants me to teach her how to subtract double digit numbers. It’s going well at first, until she’s crying in frustration, and I feel like a monster.

I tell her I’m sorry and ask her if we can try again. Through her sniffles she agrees. I flip the Banagrams tiles over to their blank side and count out fifteen. I tell her to remove twelve tiles and then count what’s left.

She understands then. She sees it. The brightest smile, like she is the sun itself, shines on me and I am so proud of her.

The pandemic starts shortly after that. We try to continue over Zoom, but she only has her mom’s phone and a spotty internet connection. One day, she is gone, and I know it is a very good thing.  I’m told her family is whole again and they are finally home.

I think about quitting. I am bad at teaching through Zoom and I really miss her. The organization needs tutors though. They say it’s important and that I’m making a difference.

I stay. There is work to be done.
 5.        The first teenagers I’m paired with ignore me. I try. I really try. It’s a running joke that I can make friends with anyone, even a dead squirrel, but I am worse than useless with teenagers. I am failing miserably. They pull their hoodies up and sleep or put in their earbuds and stare at their phones. I may as well be invisible.

I get it. I do. I was miserable at sixteen too, but this is awkward.

I get better with the teenagers, slowly. I learn the trick is to put in the effort but to pretend that it was effortless. I talk casually about my tattoos when they ask. I re-learn calculus. I watch TikToks and trending shows on Netflix.

One of them, the one who wants to be an engineer, says they need to tell me something important.

They tell me their correct pronouns.

They tell me their true name.

They tell me they’re scared.

I thank them for trusting me and I promise, cross my heart, and hope to die, that I care and that I will listen. I tell them I will show up for them and I promise it with everything that I am.

Their family leaves the shelter later that week. I am never told the circumstances and it’s the last time I see them.

I want them back. I want to keep them safe. I know I’m being selfish but my heart hurts.

I keep going. There’s work to be done.

 6.          She hugs me as I’m leaving and says, “You’re my bestie. I love you.”

She refused to talk to me at all last week, but I’m not surprised by her affection today. Some days she loves me. Some days she definitely does not. I don’t mind her mood swings because I remember how much middle school sucks. And unlike her, I didn’t have to do it after fleeing civil war or crossing continents.

“I love you too,” I tell her as I hug her tightly because it’s true.

I hope she feels loved down to the tips of her toes. I hope she wears it like armor. I hope if this is the last time I see her, she carries it with her, for all her days. She is loved.

I hope for so many things.

I know an education won’t solve all her problems. I know I cannot eliminate all the injustice and evil in this world. But I can do this work that helps her have a chance at a different future. I can be one more arrow in her quiver.

I can do this work as my heart beats fiercely, “I hope, I hope, I hope”

I have a new story up at Midwest Weird. They’re a new audio literary magazine that specializes in weirdness and Midwestern authors. I’m a bit obsessed with them. They’re a bit obsessed with my story, Growth.

But will you be obsessed with us? Maybe. Do you like weird and gross stuff? Is your humor dryer than the Sahara?

Is there something currently growing in your fridge?

Do you suspect that underneath everything, this story is actually about the anxiety and absurdity of navigating executive dysfunction and neurodivergence?

Hmm.
Strike that last one.
It’s just a little fridge blob monster. Nothing more.

But if the answer to the rest of the questions is yes, check out GROWTH

This poem is based on a true story. I get wine-drunk sometimes with my sisters and they laugh at me when I go on tangents about time travel, the multiverse and math.

As for that other thing? That unsafe man? Yes. That’s true too.

Speculative poetry though, lets you mix true and untrue. It lets you ask, “what if, what if, what if…” It lets the story become less about him. It makes it hers instead. And since the story is hers, since it’s true and untrue, she gets to have ownership of it. I asked my sister if I could write about what happened to her. I asked her if I could submit it for publication. I asked, when it was accepted, if she was okay with it being published. I asked that she read it and quit saying that she “trusted me” because I needed her to say yes with every bit of her. I even asked if it was okay to share it on social media where our friends and family overlap and people might question her or doubt her veracity or memory.

I got a yes, emphatically, every single time.

My sister thinks I’m very sweet, if a little silly to keep asking. But that’s the point – This is her story, all of it, even the parts that are my love and my fury, because they don’t exist without her. She gets to choose if and how I tell it. There are days I want to be an avenging harpy…but I have to remember, I need a yes first. It’s not mine to destroy.

And if this is your story too, you get to choose how and when and if you tell it. And if you want, if you choose, you can just hold the poem tight to your own heart. Your sisters love you and we believe you.

September has been a season of rejections, which feels like it should be illegal. I celebrated both my birthday and my wedding anniversary this month, and how dare everyone rain on my happiness parade. September is for connection and people declaring their love for me. (No, I don’t have an ego. At all. Not me.)

All the rejections have been very professional and kind, to be fair. They are always, “Thank you, but no.” or “No, but it was close, send more” and never “No, and how dare you.” The possibility of that latter response always scares the hell out of me.

But that fear’s entirely on me, you know? I made myself vulnerable and asked to be seen. There’s no guarantee anyone will like it. I know the answer is likely going to be no. The odds are not in my favor, especially when a publication only buys 12 stories a year. But courage and hope and maybe a little hubris have overwhelmed that sense of fear. I’ve made something that didn’t exist before and I’ve sent it out into the world, with a wish that it might connect with another person. It’s like a message in a bottle that’s been tossed into the ocean.

Many times, the ocean tosses it right back out. There’s a good chance I did just toss garbage into it, after all. The ocean doesn’t want that.

Garbage isn’t quite the right word. I know what I write isn’t garbage, even when I’m deep in a spiral of self-doubt. But it can also be true that I may simply not be skilled enough yet for that market. I know I’m better than I used to be at crafting stories. Logically, if I keep writing, I’m going to become more skilled. That’s how practice works.

But even then, it may not be enough. My story may be immaculately crafted and still not pass the vibe check. I write weird shit. I write beautiful shit. I write funny shit. Sometimes, I mix all that shit together, and I know it’s not going to connect with everyone. Or anyone. And I don’t say that because I think my perspective is unique and special. I say that because we all are unique and special. We all are creative. It’s part of being human. But it also means that what we love doesn’t always align.

Every now and then though, my skill and their vibes match, and I think it’s such beautiful, magical thing.

Here’s to a beautiful September. Let’s remember it as the September that I tried. Let’s remember it as a September that I was all in. That I was brave. That I hoped.

And someday, there will be a yes again.

And no, I will not be explaining further – except to say, the third is my favorite.

You all really need friends who are cheerleaders. Make sure to choose ones that will rough you up a little when your negative self-talk gets too loud. Like this:

I have another friend who is half-convinced “Strange Eons” has brought a plague of cicadas down on us all.

Despite that, she has been extremely supportive. Which I appreciate it – knowing you have a friend that will stick by you after you accidentally curse your shared city with a biblical plague is nice.

The cicadas really are everywhere this year.

This one was disgruntled that I didn’t run him over with my Jeep.

This one would have been disgruntled, but I’m pretty sure he’s dead.

I always move the cicadas off of sidewalks and away from tires when they’re drying their wings. I don’t like the idea of them getting squished.

I’m sure there’s a metaphor here about not letting your friends be squished-cicadas when they venture out into the world…but that connection is yours to make.

1. How many times do you have to be asked a question before it qualifies as an FAQ?

Don’t worry about it.

2. Did you intend to do (insert symbolic imagery, theme, and/or literary allusion) on purpose?

Probably! Like you, I am very clever. Also, I wrote it, so there’s a good chance I did it intentionally. For instance, you may have noticed the influence of Lovecraft’s, “The Nameless City” outside of the quote I pulled.

I have no memory of ever reading “The Insects from Shaggai” by Ramsey Cambell. But I read a lot of short stories and my memory is bad. So, who knows.

3. Why are so mean to Lovecraft while stealing his mythos?

Am I really that mean? I’m pretty tame, I think.

Lots of people write in Lovecraft’s world. Everyone knows he was racist. I doubt I’m the first to put the two together. Besides racists deserve to be called racist, and I hope his wimpy little ghost is huffing and puffing about it.

You can guess at what authors are afraid of by what they write into their horror. Grady Hendrix is afraid of bugs crawling in his ears. Stephen King fears teeth and cancer. R.L. Stine has a thing about garbage disposals. All of these things are objectively terrifying in the right circumstances. Lovecraft was terrified at the thought that humans weren’t the center of the universe. Of course we’re not. We never were. Get your shit together, Howard.  (Yes, yes, it’s more complicated than that. I don’t care.)

4. I would like to argue about abortion because you are wrong.

Nah.
Also, that’s not a question.

5. But you contradict yourself! You forgot to answer this question!

I didn’t forget. This is cosmic horror. That was intentional.

6. Did anyone actually ask you these questions?

No comment. I definitely have never ever interviewed myself once in my whole life.

I had a poem accepted this weekend. I haven’t signed the contract yet, so I’m not updating my “About Me” page yet but keep watching. (If anyone is reading this…I may be writing into the void and waiting for the void to answer back.)

It feels strange when people tell me they like my poetry. I want to respond like Nelson from The Simpsons, “Ha ha, you have feelings.”

It’s a silly reaction, I know. I wrote the damn thing, so obviously I tapped into those emotions and put them out in public, where people can see them. As someone who doesn’t like being perceived, I am hellbent on running straight into the sunlight.

While I try to figure that out, here’s a pig butcher/chef to ponder. I found him in an antique shop recently and I’m fairly certain he’s haunted. Or maybe he just creeps me out, as these little pig chefs have always creeped me out. Are they cannibals, serving up their fellow pigs? And if so, are they sentient? Look at that little smile. He seems so content, and almost happy, with his choices. Are they making pulled long pork, a.k.a human meat? Are there bodies hanging in a frozen meat locker somewhere?

Why does a pig have a job??? Do they even get paid minimum wage for murder?

WHY DOES HE HAVE HUMAN HANDS?

Discuss among yourselves. I’ll let you all know when/where the poem will be as soon as I know for certain.

A friend texted me last Thursday, “I wish you weren’t working on Friday. I need help moving some goats.”

I reminded her that I am always down for goat adventures and I have too much vacation that I need to burn because I work too damn much. Let’s go. I’ll bring a dog crate.

The goats were at a farm that is a safe refuge for pigs that grew too big to be pets, runaway (and unclaimed) peacocks in Indianapolis neighborhoods, and a menagerie of other farm animals. They had recently taken in eight goats that had been living in a truck. I am unclear if the truck was actually a semi/box truck or an old pickup truck. But, regardless, I imagine neither the truck nor the goats benefitted from that situation.

I like the pigs the best. We share a certain kinship.

Anyway, we very quickly loaded up two goats. You had to adopt in pairs. My friend’s young daughter picked her favorite and we requested the favorite’s best friend. You don’t break up best friends.

Goats are loud. Did you know? I knew but I absolutely did not know. Meet River Billy Beerman (River), the silver one and Hill Jack Chuckles (Jack), the calico. It was joint naming effort between the adults and young child. I think we did pretty well, but I expect the names to change and grow longer. Small children are excellent at naming animals. They also have a chicken named Bacon.

The goats are settling in, and they’ve only escaped twice (so far!). And I’ve been singing the goat version of “I knew you were trouble” non-stop.

Hire me, folks, for all your goat adventures.

Same, my friend. Same.