Jules recently celebrated a special birthday and in their Instagram party post they shared Wild Geese by Mary Oliver, which begins with - “You do not have to be good // You do not have to walk on your knees // For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting // You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves // Tell me about despair, yours and I will tell you mine.” When I met Jules we did exactly this. Shared stories about how our soft animals have made it through life and into sobriety. We talked about how we can feel stretched and need to ping back to our middles and find ourselves again, if even just for a moment sometimes. Jules is full of song and light and comedy and tragedy and is writing and performing and living their way through all of it. I am so pleased to bring you this beautiful edition of Write Speak Recover.
Please be mindful that WSR content can be thematically sensitive.
Jules
I perform as poet the jules, as CrownJuwels, as Bob - I am a poet, performance artist, drag clown, cabaret chaos - I am queer, trans, autistic, disabled - I love sunsets, rubber ducks, silver spoons, and long walks in the park - I am also a crippling alcoholic/addict and if I don't get the thoughts out of my head, I die.
Since moving to London in 2017, I have made myself a home between concrete slabs and Victorian houses, in the basements, the warehouses, theatres, clubs, within this steady flow of people, between canals and markets, planes ahead, trains beneath, a constant whisper of the city carrying me through soggy winters and scorching summers. I found my community here, groups of beautiful misfits, artists, friends and lovers that I had dreamt of since I was growing up in a small town in Germany.
I have always been a writer, since I was glueing together my own picture books, scribbling poems in my exercise books, rehearsing grand performances in front of my bedroom mirror tucked away in a house in the countryside. As soon as I knew how to pick up a pen I would let my poetry flow freely wherever it wanted to go.
Growing up, I always felt disconnected and lonely, I felt weird, wrong and left out. It took me until my late twenties to find belonging and a sense of direction. Since I was a teenager I would drink and use to quiet down my mind, the world around me seemed too painful to experience with a clear head. I would create chaos when out with my designated party people and then drink alone in my room most nights. When I wasn't self-medicating, I was daydreaming.
Eventually I knew I had to make a choice: either try to live my life or accept self-destruction. I gave life another chance, got myself into meetings, started taking my dreams seriously and ended up finding lots of the joy I had always longed for.
I found healing to be imperfect, nonlinear and messy, like dancing the cha-cha - step and slide, hard to find the middle ground. I learned that we need other people more than anything, and we need art like we need oxygen.
There has always been poetry within me, I bleed verses, my heart beats in stanzas. I have been sober and clean for 5 years, but without art, writing and my beautiful community I would not be here, and for that I am eternally grateful.
Child's Pose
grief eats away at my
hips, my shoulders, my jaw
I press my knees against
my chest as I imagine my
hands reaching out
some say waves are
most beautiful when they are
brushing against the shore
trauma creates a vacuum
where time stands still
I heard the same ringing
in my ears since I
was a child
have I not counted my
blessings in locks of hair
and plane tickets
have I not paid my
fragile ego in carefully
crafted poetry
I used to let myself
float curled up in a ball
under water now I
stopped going to
swimming pools
did you know
some sharks glow
in the depths of
the sea to
attract their
prey
violence can
be dressed to
look so divine
survival is my art
my creation is the voice
that echos in midnight
hallways and on rooftops
on the playground
in my bedroom
in the toilets at the
parties I wear my face
well but not well
enough for you
not to notice the
furrow line between
my eyebrows
I want to tell you
that two weeks ago
was the first time
I saw a shooting
star and it was shaped
like a smile
I can’t describe why
the way trees move
outside my window or
the smell of damp wood
and unwashed clothes
make my ribcage tighter
or why my body retreats
when your posture shifts
but I can give you
a pebble because it
reminds me of the
way you gaze at me
when my mouth
is shaped like
an arrow I try to
reach through
the distance
hours
apart
I tell you
how i am not
afraid of the
dark anymore
but I still leave
the light on
when I go
to sleep
yesterday
I took a picture
of the sunset
and the clouds
looked like
slugs doing
yoga
mostly I remember
things while they are
still happening
nebulous colours
behind my eyelids
when I press my
wrists against them
I can see a million
fireflies shaped
like clock hands
your tongue clicks
against the storm my
silence unravels
I can’t fight it
mostly I don’t
want to be here
flashlight eyes
your words a
lifeline your
arms are an
island but
it’s too late
in 2nd grade
I shoved the
tip of a pencil
under my skin
and the mark
stayed with me
through the years
however, recently
I discovered that
it is gone
now
On the writing process
I like to tell people about my flow, I feel it in my veins, in the way the world breathes itself outside of my body. I believe there is a heartbeat in everything. I have notebooks, pages and pages of notes on my phone and computer; I am constantly writing, even when I am sitting on a bus staring out of the window like the main character - in my head I am probably writing a poem. Poetry is my lifeforce.
Only a handful of my scribbles make it into my rotation of performance poetry; a lot of what I write is just for me to enjoy and process. If I don't get the words and images out of my head, I feel like exploding. I have journalled a lot and I am a huge fan of braindumps and free writing - whatever unlocks the creative arteries. Like the tides, my inspiration and energy for writing ebbs and flows. Being chronically ill, the brain fog will often dampen my thoughts and my body will be too tired to have me write epics. We have so much imagination inside of us, worlds and universes full of amazing things that I believe deserve to be set free and explored. Speaking our truths, creating art about ourselves and the world, is an act of resistance. This world tries to commodify everything, commercialise our art, train AI to create empty reproductions of what it could be like to be human, it is more important than ever to delve into our creative selves and not be tied down and muzzled by the imperium. Art is a conversation and it creates resonance; sharing our work creates community, and we need community to survive. Without art, writing, poetry, we are not able to survive. I have heard so many poems, seen so many performances and works of art, that saved my life, line by line, brushstroke by brushstroke. I love walking into an open mic night when the room is filled with friends, friends I have known for years and friends I haven't met yet. There is no recovery without community, and whilst writing in isolation can also be fulfilling, it is lonely work. We don't exist in a vacuum (even if I wish that sometimes, when the world gets too loud), so sharing our writing, even if it is with strangers online, our cat, or a room full of people, is a beautiful act of revolting against a system that wants our spark dead.
Writing saves my life every day. It frustrates me endlessly and then pulls me up by my bootstraps, giving me a nudge, smiling ellipses urging me to go on, one poem at a time.
Favourite poets, poetry nights, books or other resources:
My favourite poetry nights are That God Damn Poetry Jam, Process, Anthroplay and also my newest love, which is Queer Theatre UK. Of course my favourite poets are mostly friends (sorry I can’t namedrop, people will feel left out) - so I name a few known loves of mine - Andrea Gibson, Holly Mc Nish, Hera Lindsay Bird, Audrey Lorde, bell hooks, Joelle Taylor, and obviously Emily Dickinson (I probably forgot lots). My favourite books include “you better be lighting” by Andrea Gibson, “A Theory of Birds” by Zaina Alsous, “When God Was a Rabbit” by Sarah Winman and “No One Is Talking About This” by Patricia Lockwood.
And not poetry but my ultimate queer sci fi feelgood series - the Wayfarer book series by Becky Chambers (iykyk).
Anything else you’d like to add/in closing
Recovery can seem like something unachievable, even offensive when you are in the malaise of it all. I thought everything was hopeless, and I deserved to perish. I went to some of my first meetings, not convinced, thinking everyone was bullshitting - then this butch lesbian in her 70s said: “Don’t give up 5 minutes before the miracle happens.” It is so corny, but it works every time. If I can do it, you can do it, let life surprise you. Also go to poetry nights and talk to people, there are rooms full of friends and lovers that will change your life.
Write Speak Recover, in collaboration with TheNeverPress is an open, free collection of original portraits of poets using their art to find strength in their recovery journey from any form of dis-ease.
We invite you to follow Write Speak Recover on Instagram and to reach out to Tim Foley at WSR or us directly at the zine to learn more, or put yourself forward to be featured in this initiative.
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If you need support, here are some resources:
Samaritans
Alcohol Change
Recovery Dharma
Alcoholics Anonymous
This article was brought to you by Tim Foley and Graham Thomas.
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