What’s good, and how you feeling?

I, my friends, am feeling everything, including good, good, good. Shout out to Mojo City.

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Now, how many times I done said I love my city?

Well, I love Memphis—for those of you who do not know. And earlier this month, the Bluff held its annual BookStock Festival, an event showcasing local authors hosted by Memphis Public Libraries. The fact that this even exists warms my heart but then, on top of that, the fact that I was in it?! Now that’s made my whole entire month.

Some of you may know Pansy won at the Richard Wright Literary Awards—also hosted by the Memphis Public Libraries—last year. I don’t say that to brag, though it’s worthy. But because it was the catalyst to my being invited to BookStock 2026. And ain’t it just like my city to invite me into my first-ever book fest?

It’s true. I’ve dreamed of tabling at a book fair. Wasn’t quite sure how to pull it off as an indie author. Not that its impossible! People do it all the time. However, it’s often more difficult to afford and/or be welcome at book fairs as an indie author in my experience. Or was.

Upon my invitation to BookStock, I was quick to refer to past research I’d done on what I might need:

• I bought 30 copies each of my book, zine, and chapbook out-of-pocket. A pricey investment that I found to be totally worth it, plus I have some left over for upcoming events this summer. P.s.: I did not feature my first book Juniper Leaves which is very silly of me. More on this later.

• I pasted QR-code page at the top of my table to give folks a user-friendly way to pay: CashApp, Venmo, or PayPal.

• My partner agreed to table with me in case I had to run off somewhere, like the author photo-op at the top of the event.

Yet I still felt so, so green. I was surrounded by so many seasoned authors with their 6-foot banner stands and themed merch. Authors of all styles and genres, some of whom stopped by my table to commune and tell me about their decades-long book fair-hopping ventures. Full of brilliant successes. I knew, from hearing them, I have much to learn. But I’m working on enjoying the newness of experiences I have now. I love the thought of still doing things that makes me nervous in my mid-thirties, and I want that feeling in my 50s, 60s, 80s. So better appreciate it now, right?

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I wasn’t pressed about making any sales this time around. Not for real, for real. I simply wanted to experience this thing I’ve wondered about all these years, and simply being there was my accomplishment. But then I did sell books! And I connected with avid readers who signed up for my newsletter, and told me about their literary interests, and took the time to learn about the things I’ve written. It was cool as hell. Truly. I cannot wait to do it again.

I lean towards introversion yet I love being amongst my people. So, naturally, the latter happens just a hair above once in a blue moon. But that’s all changing now, especially since I’ve opted out of social media so heavily (not on purpose really, just because it doesn’t feel good,. And like I’ve said, we only doing what pleases us these days).

I’ve been enjoying myself. I love seeing y’all in person, chatting about books, teaching and facilitating classes with my peers. We have fun. I know some of you reading can attest to that!

I plan on doing many more literary events than I have in the past, both virtual and in-person. So if you have an event you think I’d enjoy, let me know. I’m ready.

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Speaking of being amongst the people, I’ll be teaching a virtual class Saturday, June 13 with about overcoming writer’s block.

Essentially, I’m offering a framework of how to rethink writer’s block that I learned during my four year journey writing Pansy that embraces the stillness of the creative process rather than resents or ignores it.

I haven’t had a block since my first year of that journey and been itching to tell people what I learned ever since. So if you’ve ever experienced writer’s block or you are currently, I welcome you to tap in.

Literary Liberation

Writer's Block Isn't Real: On Embracing Stillness

If someone forwarded this to you, subscribe here! If you want to get in touch, email here…

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2 months ago · 5 likes · Literary Liberation and Jasper “Jaz” Joyner

Before I go, huge shout out to on a successful Kickstarter campaign to restore the Afro-Punk documentary! The campaign exceeded its initial goal which means we all get to enjoy The Vault, aka hours of exclusive interviews and concert footage from the filming of this work, on YouTube, very soon.

I’m so hype and will most definitely be tuning in. And thank goodness this very important piece of history gets to live on in this way.

Here’s where I gushed about the doc a couple years back:

Now, I’m feeling fun. So if you’ve made it this far, comment the last book you read that you really enjoyed. I’ll send the first responder a signed copy of Pansy.

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Okay, I’ll talk to y’all again very soon!

Love,

Jasper

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Hello beautiful people,

I’m here to share so cool ass news. Some wonderful contributors and I have been working on a zine about DEI with Microcosm Publishing for many months now, and it’s finally coming out March 24th.

It’s called Worth the Wage?: Let’s Talk About Workplace Microaggressions and it’s the print edition of (H2C), a digital zine where Black and brown folks can share their workplace microaggressions and DEI blunders.

PRE-ORDER WORTH THE WAGE

Here to Complain came to be after an especially foul job interview I had in 2023 involving far too many microaggressions to name in just one sentence. I needed a space to vent freely and commiserate with folks who understand, and figured other folks needed the same. So naturally, that sentence became the first-ever H2C essay:

here to complain

My lousiest interview experience in a very long 'periololically' time

As a professional writer for the past decade, I pride myself on killing it in interviews. Before this hellish 2023 I just knew if I got that “let’s chat” email, the job was mine. But this semi-recent interview is by far the absolute worst job-related experience I’ve had in years…

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3 years ago · 3 likes · Jasper “Jaz” Joyner

Now in its third year, H2C has featured several professional’s stories either publicly or anonymously. I’m talking brilliant yoga instructors, masons, writing tutors; all folks with a harrowing tale to tell. Worth the Wage features six of those stories, plus some art work.

I am so, so proud of this project. It’s been a true labor of love, thanks to these wonderful and thoughtful contributors. Also? Working with an anti-Amazon company in the indie zine and book publisher Microcosm has been so damn cool. For real, shout out to them for moving as ethically as they have since 1996!

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So, I’m stepping outside of my usual subject matter here in my personal newsletter because this work deserves the love. This post is absolutely dedicated to Worth the Wage, and to the radical history of zines for which this one can now join. That fact truly blows my mind. I’ll leave y’all here to the original post, to learn more:

here to complain

The Here to Complain print zine is here!

We’re back, and with BIG news…

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4 months ago · 2 likes · H2C Team

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And friends—Feel free to tell a friend. Zines are for sharing!!

PRE-ORDER WORTH THE WAGE

Happy lovin’ Black History Month y’all,

You know…

February is for lovers, if you ask me. And ain’t nobody ask me, but since we’re here.

February is for lovers of love, and for me it has oddly very little to do with Valentine’s day. Much more to do with the energy of the season steadily reminding me to live and love boldly all the time.

Cause to be Black is lovely, and my collective ancestors get so much love around this time of year. And? If you must know, me and my loves’ anniversary happens to fall in this month. Fine, you got me! And yes, we are both Black, and yes it matters. No shade!

But alas, I’m feeling all the love and so I’d like to share some lovey-dovey things with you if I may…

Let’s travel back in time:

To 2018. I am nearly 29, single. Yearning. Wanting, wanting, big love, small love, girl, any love. I am healing much better now from a wild ass break up. Therapized, and feeling worthy, and so I’m ready, y’all. To thirst out loud.

Enters: @QTPoCPersonals; a response to the much whiter Personals on Instagram, that later becomes the dating app, Lex.

I submit two ads in the span of a few months, right before making my move to LA. Each time feels good, to be so bold as to poetically yearn like that in public.

My first read:

Pressed over femmes who used to get their hair pressed. Spring has sprung. Let’s get into it.

Like, c’mon. I ate that! Don’t even play with meeee.

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Now let’s go back-back, even further now: to 1988

Graphic designer Alan Bell launches Black lesbian and gay Blk Magazine in December of 1988. He’s motivated to do so by Black HIV/AIDS activists who are so very tired of the lack of information about their communities in mainstream media.

In its six years of existence, this magazine featured interviews with queer icons like Audre Lorde and Marlon Riggs, news on Black LGBT issues, and, most relevant to this post, personals.

(Highly recommend checking out its archives. Some of those covers? Iconic. Cunt. Amazing.)

It fascinates me how underground my Black queer ancestors had to be. How creative, how stealthy yet still so, so bold. Like, y’all, this is what being horny on main used to be. Brilliant. BLK Magazine paved the way for QTPoCPersonals, and continues to live in the minds of Black queer folks like me as a reminder that we persist, and with so much style and love!

In 2023, inspired by my queer ancestors, I archived my ads in a chapbook called “A Flamboyance.” That’s what you see me holding in the photo above.

A flamboyance, yes. Like a flock of flamingos. Isn’t that so good? That they represent such bold beauty, such romantic assertion? And here we are in February, a short and fleeting month, requiring intention or nothing at all. Truly, might February be the most romantic month of all simply because it must be savored, or you’ll blink and its gone? I know we get upset sometimes at Black History Month being the shortest time of year, and I honor that feeling.

But man, do I love a month that requires so much intention.

Now, I’mma try something cute, see who chimes in; anybody wanna share what your personal ad might be in the comments? I am so incredibly curious. P.S.: no such thing as cringe over here. Be flamboyantly thirsty! Poetically want!

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Now, three historically horny arts I feel capture the ~vibe~ of this post (for BHM, of course):

• The brilliant Minnie Riperton’s “Inside My Love”: You cannot tell me this isn’t the horniest song ever made, my god.

• “Poo Poo La La” by the late-great Roy Ayers: The name, even? C’mon. It’s groovy, funky, funny, silly, fun, and bold. Also, small inside-the-writer-studio fact: I played this on a loop during the entire duration of my writing this first draft.

• “A Recreation,” a poem by the brilliant Audre Lorde. Y’all there is a part of this poem that goes “my body/writes into your flesh/the poem/you make of me”
  BITCH.

Oh and, obvious honorable mention to “Erotic City” by Prince cause, duh.

You can read more about my chapbook, A Flamboyance here. I’m really proud of it, and I can say unequivocally my most playful work, yet:

buy A Flamboyance

Before we go, I’d like to thank each and every one of you who showed up and out for our first free writing workshop! It was so fun and I can’t wait to stay connected with each of you, and possibly see you at the next one. BTW, we talked about the next one being paranormal fiction, anyone interested??

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Alright. Had so much fun writing this post. Talk to y’all again, soon. Happy loving!

Send me a tip for BHM

Order PANSY from my site

Hello, hello, hello,

I come to you from the deep. A mudskipper. Damp and cold but breathing as I walk on solid ground.

Mudskippers — of which there are 25 species, inhabiting mudflats, swamps, and mangrove forests from Africa to South Asia to South America — spend more than half of their life on land, doing everything from eating to mating out of the water. - source, Discover Magazine

Friends, I wrote a 1727-word essay to share with you here about rebelling as an artist against the algorithm. It included cited sources, thoughtful insight, advice. And it was the most ironic gesture by me, someone who claims resistance against the algorithm (and the machine) by opting out of the discourse.

Truly, the poetry in this essay’s creation is damn near hilarious. And though I will not share it, I’m grateful. I will, instead, consider it a…thought exercise ((ha!). For I am renewed in my commitment to what actually feels right in my spirit (see: pleasure activism). I’m telling you, the whole time I was writing I kept asking myself if all of this was truly necessary from me. Me, specifically. Still those other roads—ones that prompt engagement, that fuel this very internet with that incessant need for back-and-forth—can be so tempting. And not always unnecessary! Just not my path, you see.

Bottom line, I got distracted! But I’m back. Hello, hello, hello again.

As I was closing out a draft of that aforementioned work, I stumbled on this poem by called “I think we forgot this is social media, too.” It says much of what I articulated in my essay but most of all, it reminded me; the focus is the art. That is the point, the work, and my answer! So thank you Venusia for this reminder. Whew. Art really be saving me time and time again.

Fast forward to this moment. Instead of that essay, I now share with you a poem called “mudskipper” about this, and that, and where and how the artist connects in this digital age amid late stage capitalism.

mudskipper

I once knew a girl who lived on land
and sea
for the simple trifle really
price of her voice
and is it not an honor to experience both
to know the deep though you may never ever return
home now
is to be free under the sun
without a worry you can share
and so all is presumably well
but if I were to stumble on sweet powers such as this
for which I had such options as to give or take
might I request the life of a mudskipper
and be at home in the deep
exploring on land and moving, moving
wherever, whenever, however, I please

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Very excited to announce the first installment in this year’s free writing class series:

Magical Realism in Memoir!
Monday, February 9, 6pm - 7:15pm CST, via Zoom (virtual)

Brief description: After a breakdown on exactly what magical realism is, we’ll explore how this style can be used in first-person non-fiction writing, inspired by Audre Lorde’s Zami and my use of this style in my memoir, Pansy.

Yes, this class absolutely free. Registration is required so we can keep the class on the smaller side, so everyone has time to ask questions at the end. You can register here.

Allow me to be a new kind of vulnerable here (ahhh!). Since I have chosen to do things my way and resist social media in possibly what many might call an almost foolish way (verdict’s still out), I’mma try this new thing of asking you, dear reader, to share this work if it spoke to you. Tell somebody, post it somewhere. Help this art reach (digital) rooms I’m not privy to as I figure out how the hell to exist in this digital age. Thank you so, so much.

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Alright everyone, I will be speaking to you all very soon. <3

Jasper

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My chapbook, A Flamboyance

Buy my memoir PANSY

What you been reading lately?

I just finished Pleasure Activism, written and curated by the amazing adrienne marie brown, and y’all. I’m revived.

Essentially, adrienne marie brown describes pleasure activism as “… us learning to make justice and liberation the most pleasurable experiences we can have on this planet.” (See: a quick breakdown of pleasure activism written by the author)

It seems so simple. To lead with what feels good and right in your core towards a better future for everyone. But it’s also so easy to get distracted. Toni Morrison spoke of how distraction as a tool of racism keeps you from doing your work, and of course racism can represent all things under the umbrella of white supremacy; all the isms.

Pleasure activism helps us focus, helps us remember what the work really is, and how deeply it matters. Shout out to the honorable ancestor, Audre Lorde for a blueprint of this philosophy, so wonderfully expressed in her essay (also featured in the book), “Uses of the Erotic.” And to Octavia Butler, frequently referenced in the book as adrienne’s ancestral kindred spirit and teacher, who emphasized the beauty and power of change.

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It will be winter, soon. This is a time for rest, quiet, reassessment, release. I am so full and inspired that I am beyond excited as to what will be born from this. In the meantime though, I am continuously and endlessly grateful for good books, good art.

good art
be antidote for present poison
we reject
we ingest
created, creation
be felt, be good
good art

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Somatic coach and philanthropist Alta Starr said, in conversation with adrienne, that someone once called her a “disciple of joy.”

The whole point of this newsletter, its intention from jump, was/is to bring joy, and in turn, pleasure.

I have not heard a better descriptor of what I feel this newsletter, and much of my creative intention, happen to be rooted in. And so it’s wild that I have only just read this book, and been blessed with its many, many gems.

I’d like to offer you just a few quotes I highlighted during my read. Albeit, out of context of the larger work, but nonetheless poignant, and perhaps inspiring some sort of journey of thought for you, as they did for me:

When asked to share a fundamental truth about pleasure, elder feminist and activist Idelisse Malave said:

Perhaps my mantra: “If it pleases me, I will.” I don’t mean free license to do whatever I want regardless of the consequences to me or others. Pleasure is deeper than that—it encompasses our values.

In the chapter called “Who taught you to feel good,”adrienne says:

Does the agenda or space allow for aliveness, connection, and joy? Is there a “yes!” at the center of the work? There are so many things that are violent, offensive, unbearable. An embodied “no” is so justified—but I don’t believe it moves us forward. “Yes!” has a future. ”

Alta Starr shares her thoughts on pains place in questions of pleasure:

Pleasure, for me, doesn’t exclude or deny pain. The same self, the same inclusive awareness that allows me to experience pleasure, may retreat or cramp up in the face of pain (physical or emotional) but returns, and so far, is always bigger and able to absorb or metabolize it. What do I mean? A light example: say, I drop a can of baked beans on my toe! OWWWWW! And, of course, sit and cradle the toe in my hands and squinch up (you know, squinch, all tight), and breathe, and get curious, invite my awareness to be with that pressure and cramp and burning ache, and so far, every time, that awareness changes my relationship to what hurts. Of course, the pain of personal loss or of our suffering world asks for an even larger and steadier awareness, anchored in that livingness that neither loses nor suffers.

A reverberating question for me now from the chapter, “It’s time to reclaim our skin:”

Can we remember what it is to be alive with each other, beyond suffering and survival?

And another, in chapter “Liberating your fantasies:”

So few people make it to this question: what do I really want?

I’ll leave us there for now. I’ve mentioned before how I’m the type to know within seconds if a book, film, etc. isn’t for me (or, at least, not at that moment). I now have the language to know that this is simply me leading with what pleases me. And it always leads me places like this. So worth it.

As humans, we are inspired by art to be more deeply ourselves. And as an artist, I have a responsibility, as Toni Cade Bambara said, to make the revolution into this becoming irresistible. I can only do that if I am so deeply in love with the future I am working to build. This requires pleasure.

And, oh, it pleases me.

P.s.: Pleasure Activism is available via the Queer Liberation Library, a free library full of all genre of books by queer authors.

*Whispers*: My book and audiobook Pansy are there, too!

Join Queer Liberation Library

Class time!

Last post, I proposed a fun idea of offering free classes. Many of y’all were interested!

So. There are five classes, listed in the survey below. I’ll explain each of them in this post (scroll for more). Note that each lesson will be ~1-hour presentation with time for questions throughout, and at the end.

Once you have a look, feel free to click on the link and pick your preference.

I’m thinking we’ll do one free class every two-three months, so even if your pick doesn’t win this time, we’ll come back around to it. In early January, I’ll reach out to those of you who responded and we’ll go from there for scheduling and such.

What should the first free class be?

Using magical realism in memoir/essay writing: We’ll explore how magical realism can be used in first-person non-fiction writing, inspired by Audre Lorde’s Zami and my use of this style in my memoir, Pansy.

Intro to magical realism: We’ll explore this fascinating genre’s history, elements, and uses. You’ll leave with a basic understanding of the genre and how to approach it in your writing.

Overcoming writer’s block: Many of us may have experienced what is often called “writer’s block,” also known as creative blocks. But what if this artistic phenomenon is fundamentally misunderstood? I’ll work to re-frame the concept of “writers block” in order to help writers overcome and even prevent its future instances.

The personal essay and you: We’ll explore notable memorist over the generations, like Kiese Laymon, Maya Angelou, and David Sedaris to better understand what makes an impactful personal essay.

Intro to fantasy writing: We’ll explore the basics of fantasy writing by learning about it’s many sub-genres, and how (and why) to world-build.

p.s.s: If you know someone who might be interested in these classes, feel free to share this post and they can fill out the survey as well.

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See y’all in 2026!

Love,

Jasper

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Today friends, we discuss communal love.

If you love me, you gotta love me for rеal

The lyrics above come from a song I’ve been oh-so-obsessed with lately called “Love Me For Real” by Rim Kwaku Obeng and Kasa. I sing them in my head so often these days, with community in mind.

The message of this song, when Rim’s story remains a cautionary tale of community failed, isn’t lost on me. The innovative musician wrote it after over a decade of struggling, spearheaded by an act of betrayal by a former bandmate who threatened to sue him if he left the band to collaborate with Quincy Jones.

If you say you love your people, how do you show it? What ways do you step outside of yourself to love on the ones you think about constantly? That is what I ask myself. And I’m endlessly discovering new ways I might show this love.

I’ll credit this next way to someone I quite admire, whose Substack I’ve collaborated with, in fact (see: a story about my former honey bun obsession).

Jacinta of reached out not long ago to share interest in a Magical Realism in Memoir writing class I was teaching with Narratively. From our conversation I thought, wait. Why am I not offering free writing classes online??

It’s something I’ve been doing in person for years, often lending my services to the local Memphis Libraries with free fantasy writing camps for teens and workshops for adults on anything from overcoming writer’s block to essay writing…

Would y’all be interested in free and pay-what-you-can writing workshops? If so, I’d love to start doing these. They’d be open to all; you don’t have to follow this newsletter to join.

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Love Us For Real: on Memphis

I wrote this first on paper. A rare, rare thing for me these days beyond those vital journal entries. Why, rare? Because it saves paper? Because it’s easier to type, autocorrect included?

Because it is far more convenient. Because I’ve become so accustom to this digital life I lead. It is easier, I tell myself. But friends, I’ve been thinking so much about the insidiousness of ease.

I live, like many of you, in the imperial core. Where I may get water out of the faucet and shower when I feel the need. Now is a strange time in which I notice odd and frequent power outages in my area in Memphis, TN, where xAI wreaks havoc.

And I remember, the imperial core, for great reason, is crumbling. And it crumbles at our expense.

My dear friend, activist, educator, and public health leader, Jessie Claudio, was on a podcast recently called Be For Real, created by some wonderful folks I’m in community with through Headliners Memphis. And there, he talked about that convenience, and how we can show up for each other and ourselves right now.

Now, I’m mighty biased, obviously, for many reasons but especially cause they spend a good while going up for Memphis in the episode. Talking about how people love what our city offers—the music, the genuine hospitality, the food, the culture—but don’t love us enough to care about how we’re harmed.

Despite my bias, I think anyone can learn a lot about what’s really happening in Memphis from this episode, from xAI’s effects to ICE and the National Guard in our streets, and just general facts about the so called increase in crime.

Love it For Real?

Alright y’all. One way you can love me for real is by supporting my work. The new audiobook version of my memoir, PANSY is out now, which means you can listen to it literally today if you so choose. Please do! And tell a friend. <3

You can also listen to it for free in the Queer Liberation Library.

Buy Pansy, the audiobook

Sending all of you so much love. I hope you have so much of it that it overflows into those you love, too.

Talk soon,

Jasper

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Y’all I’m so hype to be writing this:

I come to you on the other side of a feat—a feat I tell you—of recording an audiobook for my award-winning memoir, Pansy.

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I really got into my acting bag with this one. *Takes one acting class in college.*

The goal was to capture the true essence and rhythm of the written edition, and I feel wholeheartedly that we got there, friends.

As a writer who’s struggled to read with a learning disability (as noted in this very book), audiobooks continue to expand my literary scope. I often use them to supplement my reading experiences with written copies, so it only made sense to give an audiobook option for Pansy; for fun but also for better accessibility.

Now more folks regardless of literacy levels can experience this work if they so choose, and that makes me so happy.

Order Pansy - OUT OCT 28

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This, like the written version, is an indie project of which I was the narrator and sound engineer, and I learned so much! After much research, study, and hard work, it’s here, and I’m proud.

Have a listen to chapter seven of Pansy: A Black American Memoir, the audiobook, below. You can follow along with the written excerpt here.

Or, enjoy a mini-version of this excerpt at the bottom of this post.

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PANSY, the audiobook will be available at a discounted rate now through the first week of its release on Tuesday, October 28, so if you’re interested, now is the perfect time to cop you one.

P.S.: Be sure to pre-order your copy from Libro.fm. Every copy they sell supports indie bookstores across the U.S..

Pre-order PANSY, the audiobook

Thank y’all so much for continuing to support this memoir in all of its iterations. So looking forward to y’all going on this audio journey with me.

Short excerpt of chapter 7, for kicks:

Order the written version of PANSY

Hello friends,

I’ve found you at the cusp of a new season. Where I sit it’s still hot and fiery, and old ways are still burning. Might this film add some necessary fuel as we continue to discover what serves us, and what doesn’t.

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…Before Huey Freeman from The Boondocks uttered two words, there was his fictional ancestor, revolutionary prototype, Dan Freeman, The Spook Who Sat by the Door (1973). And then, the FBI feared Freeman and this film so much, they tried to destroy it.

But friends, I’m here to tell you, in case you hadn’t known. The Spook Who Sat by the Door still lives.

Below is the transcript from an interview with Robert Townsend where he shares how Spook is the reason he got into filmmaking at all:

The Spook Who Sat by the Door changed my life. I’m from Chicago, and I saw it in the Woods Theater. I love movies, and I remember going to see Superfly and The Shaft, Dynamite, stuff like that. And then there’s this movie called The Spook Who Sat by the Door.

So I go in there—it’s on the bill with two other movies—but something about this movie is real different to me. I don’t know what it is. But it’s like the theme of revolution, the theme of Black people working together, making a difference, changing, taking control of their destiny; it affected me.

I told everybody at school about it that Monday, and it was gone Tuesday. It was literally in the theaters for a week. And it stayed in my head. I think part of the reason I’m a filmmaker and I’m a writer, director, producer, actor, all of that, is because of Spook. Because there was a sense of, “What if we took our destiny into our own hands?”

Visionary author Sam Greenlee first published the novel version of The Spook Who Sat by the Door in 1969. It’s the thrilling and often satirical story of the first black CIA officer, Dan Freeman, who, once enlisted becomes “the spook who sits by the door” to greet fellow CIA officers amazed to find how newly diverse their department has become. After years mastering all he’s taught in the agency, Freeman drops out to help young Black men in his hometown of Chicago as a social worker, or so he tells the higher ups.

Meanwhile, he’s actually training these young men on how to start and lead a revolution.

Sam Greenlee was a Chicago native and lived in similar areas around his city till he passed in 2014. Shortly after release of the novel, he teamed up with director Ivan Dixon to produce the film and fully funded it with majority Black investors. After diligent work and organizing, they were able to get Spook to play in major theaters, but for only a short time…

Both Greenlee and Dixon have said that the removal of the Spook from theaters was a result of FBI pressure on the film’s distributor, claiming it would incite race riots. Given what we know now of the FBI's tactics (see: COINTELPRO (Counter Intelligence Program)), this is a likely assumption.

(P.S.: Here’s a link on the layered history of the term “spook,” in case you were wondering about that.)

Right now, as I write this, the National Guard is on its way to terrorize my city, Memphis. A city that, mind you, just reported its crime rate at a 25-year low despite the frequently pushed misinformation that tells folks the opposite. A Black-ass city, a brilliant city. The sort of city The Spook represents…

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I first learned about this film three years ago while watching the Netflix documentary, Is This Black Enough for You?

I added it to my already long watchlist along with some other future faves and then time passed. Years worth of time.

Then, perhaps randomly, perhaps because right now calls for it, I remembered this film. And I remembered, too, that it was first a book. I checked it out on Libby, lost my mind (in the best way), and then searched online for a way to watch it.

Friends, I should warn you, this was indeed difficult. No major streaming service carries Spook (as one might expect, for a film like this of which the FBI had such an eye on).

Luckily, it can be found on the Internet Archives, or on a few gracious YouTube channels. At least as I write this post.

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I find it absolutely beautiful and amazing that this film they™ tried to erase lives on through Robert Townsend, a creative mind who has indeed inspired a whole generation of other artists. Is that not the power of art? To inspire others? To wake up whole worlds in the minds of creative thinkers who had no idea they were waiting on that very message to come alive?

So, I’ll leave you here. Though there are many more words I could write. Because, friends, I am just the messenger on this one. The message (The Spook), still awaits.

I hope that if this is your first time learning of this film, you are able to watch it. Or, start with this interview of Spook creator Sam Greenlee produced by Robert Townsend…

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You been drinking water? You been breathing with intention? You been looking at your friends in their faces, and telling them you love them? Have you?

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Have you been writing out your worries, feeling your feelings, letting yourself grieve and putting that pain somewhere right?

You been loving yourself, or you been trying? You been dancing to new music, to old, to the song in your head? You been singing along? You been singing at all? You been good to yourself, you been trying? You been surviving? You been surviving? You been surviving?

Me, too. And I am simply here to check in. I love us so much, and I am asking myself so, so many questions lately. I am questioning, curious, learning, thinking. Thinking out loud.

Dear people, I hope that you are well. And I know that is a big hope at a time like this.

Cause How.

How do we “be” at a time like this? How?

How is it we simply are? Doing this. This.

Are we not fantastic? Living this, stranger than fiction? Somehow?

The “how” begets itself.

The “how” inspires me. Everyday.

NOTE: Jasper wrote a whole ass essay here, full of pontifications and platitudes, and even an Octavia Butler reference. And then? They deleted every single bit of it. It was no fun at all to read, or to write, therefore not suitable for this newsletter.

This version has been much more fun, and that is very, very important to the author. Especially right now.

Movie time

My partner has two, identical Danny DeVito shirts. One I got them for a birthday (due to their professed love for this man’s art early in our relationship), and another that already existed, of which I knew nothing about at the time. Needless to say, they are a stan.

And I’ve learned through them of Danny DeVito’s expansive directorial scope, spanning way past one of my favorite movies of all time; Matilda.

Specifically, I highly recommend Throw Momma from the Train. It’s currently free on Tubi. Do you have a favorite Danny DeVito film?

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…

As I get deeper into my Letterboxd bag, one of my greatest goals has been to watch his whole filmography. It’s gonna take a minute.

One way I like to have fun is through teaching. I have a class coming up, about a thing I love so deeply; magical realism in memoir. I teamed up with for a 3-hour seminar on Infusing Memoir Writing with Magical Realism on Wednesday, September 17 from 6 pm to 9 pm ET.

Come join, if you are able and interested.

Thank y’all. Sending so much love, and talk soon,

Jasper

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I hope you’re well in every way you can be. I am well and I owe it all to art. I’d like to share some of it with you, and perhaps it’ll feed you, too…

This art is from the Amazon and it is called Wasca.

It follows hayakwaska, or ayahuasca as it’s come to be known, and its recent extraction leading to environmental destruction, cultural exploitation, and marginalization of Amazonian people, all in the name of healing and wellness.

Wasca is a documentary of sorts, but I feel strange calling it a documentary because in it, there are no talking heads. No “experts” personally removed from the subject at hand, telling us, the viewer, what hayakwaska means to its people. Instead, indigenous storyteller Nina Gualinga and her people, the Kichwa of Sarayaku, Ecuador, speak of their land in their own words.

They tell us that their spiritual connection to the hayakwaska plant once helped them protect their land from devastating oil extraction by the Ecuadorian state. And now, that very plant is being colonized and exploited by people who don’t know or care who they hurt by using it.

At one point, a Kichwa elder said, “How can those who do not live here possibly understand how our life systems are connected between plants, animals, community, culture, and knowledge? Growing up in the forest we learn to know and love her deeply. When hayakwaska is taken out of its original context it becomes superficial and self centered.”

I was so moved by all the truth they told, and the way they told it. There is no better way to finish this story, really, than to experience their telling it first hand…

I could speak for hours of the way this story connects so closely to others all around the world. The Congo and cobalt, my city Memphis’ water and xAI, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the 2016 attempt at a destructive pipeline on their sacred land. It is the shared history for every single Black and Indigenous people harmed by colonization and globalism, since the beginning of white reign.

We know. We know the sacredness of land and earth and our connection to it, and the many excuses (cell phones! technological progression! the global economy!) white supremacy says it must destroy.

We also, though, must know our power. We, the people of those sacred lands. Wasca has reminded me of that power, and the constant urge for us all to forget; to exist as if we are not us. As if we’re something less.

I choose to celebrate us. I choose to remember.

…Won’t you celebrate with me, like Lucille Clifton said?

“…Come celebrate / with me that everyday / something has tried to kill me / and has failed.”

Now, some news! My memoir Pansy is a finalist for the Quill Prose Award!

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I’m so grateful for the recognition. I have many complex feelings about literary awards but at the base of things, it simply feels good to know other people appreciate this work. And what warms my heart even more?! Some of you literally funded my submission to that very award. Thank YOU. This has truly been a community project, y’all.

I’m so, so grateful for all the love this book has been getting. Not too long ago, it won Best Young Adult Nonfiction at the 3rd annual Richard Wright Literary Awards, and as of yesterday, it put me on the cover of Artist Feature Magazine. On top of that, Pansy continues to get shout outs from reviewers and publications I respect.

Please, if you feel so inclined, share some good news of your own in the comments.

Let us celebrate you. Let us celebrate us.

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I’ll leave you all with this interlude from Vince Staple’s latest album, Dark Times.

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Read more from Jasper:

I sometimes feel rude. Bringing my tail over here, sharing my little essays. My ideas, my this-my that. Often, unsolicited. At a time like this?

I imagine I’m not alone in this feeling. I imagine sharing art for so many of us right now feels silly, at best. Like the most irrelevant thing to place your focus on as white supremacy tries it’s damnest to burn us all down with it. But if we’re being honest, art is the only thing keeping a lot of us alive.

Still. It is only human to want to stop everything else and gawk in silence when watching something giant collapse.

Creating feels like the most irrational choice but I suppose I resign to the irrational. Because there is no new beyond collapse without creation. What does balance look like in the middle of an end? What does rest, peace, solace, look like? I have no answers yet. I am creating through confusion. Creating as medicine, sharing as resistance to facist demands to cease. It is usually exhausting.

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I am exhausted. My exhaustion makes me delusional. My delusion makes me laugh. I laugh a lot. So in honor of our collective need for art, paired with that exhaustion I mentioned, I offer you things I’ve written before that might make you laugh, too:

• My interview with comedian Sheria Mattis as part of my ‘Why Are You Funny’ series. There’s audio and text.

• My now award-winning (!) memoir PANSY. I’ve been told it’s got some good ‘lil laughs in there (thank you, , for its most recent review!).

• That time I imagined I was a time traveler and did a Reddit-style AMA

• I was briefly a high school cheerleader, and I lived to tell the tale.

• And finally, I don’t mention my chapbook A FLAMBOYANCE, enough. It’s a playful collection of prose and poetry that (loosely) addresses the theme of flamboyance.

Alright, I’mma leave y’all with this new poem, related to the above, that will surely go through several other iterations. But this is it’s first…

I laugh
ain’t shit funny but
I laugh
and loud
till my belly aches
and my jaw hurts
and I feel
a different kind of pain
cause tears of laughter taste much sweeter
and heal the hurt
as they flow down the curves of my skin
seeping in again as epsom salt
all strain evaporating
much like grief

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Thanks everybody for reading. I will talk to you soon,

Jasper

I’m so delighted friends, because it’s National Poetry Month. This is a time after my own heart.

Poetry is my lifeblood. It is the foundation of everything. Every thing. Everything.

I have no rhythm
we have no rhythm
no heart beat
no beauty
no love
without poetry

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So, in honor of this time I love so much, I’ve delved into old words but timeless rhythms I’ve shared on this very site before. These words are special to me because they come from my third-ever post here on Substack—from three years ago!

I didn’t read poetry out loud as much then. Almost blasphemous to think of that now. Now, that I have affirmed how vital it is for me to read poetry out for the world to hear, even the trees. I shared a poem in my memoir Pansy called ‘How to read poetry’ that simply says:

How to Read Poetry

It’s always best to speak the truth
out loud

This is my ministry. There is simply no other way. So, in honor of this truth I don’t see no other way to do it. Here is my poem from years ago, called

This Is Meditation…

They say time don’t matter
when every song
has rhythm
and you better have a reason for clapping off
beat
and once we were babies
and now we’re grown
and once I made a joke
and no one laughed
and everyone dies
don’t tell me
this moment isn’t everything

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Do you ever just feel words so much that all you can do is write them out? Reflexive, almost. Like breathing? That is how this poem came to be, and it lives in me and I think of it every now and then, like I think of time.

Much love to you all. This was a short one. Not gonna burden y’all with words, words, words in a poetry post, where the most powerful of them all seem to do the most with the least. I’ll leave you with a wish for love and care and good times. As many and as much as you can get. And poetry. Good, good, poetry.

I’ll see you all soon,

Jasper

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p.s.: Here’s another one of my poems, read aloud:

And my entire collection of Substack writing:

Hello friends,

Here we are again, at our meeting grounds. Digital, of course, but we’re all here, no? I come to you fresh off teaching a spring fantasy writing camp for teens, and I am so, so inspired. The kids—despite all this—will be just fine. As fine as they can be.

I am so inspired that I’ve written a fantasy short story that I’d like to share, about a journey.

What sort of journey? Well, you’ll just have to see. So join me. Let’s go; let’s ride.

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as we journey among the Spring, a short story

1972

Springwood Forest; the forest of many lives, of many whispers within its bushes and under its soil. It was no normal forest, they’d say, if such a thing even exists, and it was no normal trek were you to find yourself among its trees.

Springwood had few travelers; for few knew about it at all. And those who did know called it Swing, a sort of melding together of its one word so it flowed right off the tongue. An even more mysterious name of an already mysterious land of which could be found on no one’s map.

Travelers would say, ‘I’m going to Swing,’” and like it’s limited notarity, few knew what that meant.

“Swing? At your big age?” The folks would ask. Because usually, all travelers were older than eighteen.

And the travelers nary explained, because if you did not know about this forest yet, you weren’t supposed to know. Sarah knew. She was nineteen, and she’d known since she was ten. Her mother told her, whose mother told her, whose mother told her, too. And always, when one was told, they were also warned to keep it to themselves.

Sarah learned of it one day when her mother sat her down and said, “It’s time I tell you about Swing Forest.”

The mother told Sarah it was close by. Closer than she thought, and that, “You’ll find it. One day.”

“When’?!” She asked, but her mother gave her no answer, only that when she found her way there, the hardest part would be finding her way out. “And when you do, child, you will be different. You will be changed.”

Sarah nodded, perplexed as she was. Could tell by her mother’s tone that there would be no more details. And she grew weary, oh so weary, of this “Swing” forest, with its funny name and curious lore.

As the years went on, Sarah grew obsessed. She never told a soul, but in her mind she would wonder. Searching up and down the isles in her library for even a mention of this forest. She called it "Swing,” then "Springwood,” then “Spring Time,” like others called it, so her mother told. But nothing. No signs at all. No where to point on the map, no hints from any book at all.

Till one day. Sarah was going to bed. “Was” being the key word. But a bright light out her window shone so vividly that any sort of attempt at sleep would be a joke. So she hoped out of bed and looked out her window at a far enough distance in case running would be at all necessary. And there it was. In place of the house next door to hers were trees and trees and trees. A forest. The forest—she just knew it. This was Swing.

You might have thought Sarah would be curious enough to see more, but you would be wrong. Dear Sarah, instead, hopped in bed and shuddered at the thought of this world of which she’d been told, because she’d never expected it all to happen like this. So suddenly, after years of nothing. Like it’d been there the whole time. She’d never considered how it would feel to find it, or for it to find her.

But Sarah could not hide even though she wanted, because right as she tried her damnest to settle in between her sheets, that whole bed beneath her back collapsed. Down fell Sarah to a new bed made of dirt and moss, and grass between trees she’d just seen, now surrounding her.

No bedroom, no house, no neighbors, no more. Just forest, as far as her eyes would land. Then whispers. Quiet, quiet whispers but as if inside her ears. So close, yet so inaudible. Just a stew of words like gumbo bubbling inside her head. Quite reasonably, Sarah froze. Just on the ground there, frozen and looking ahead. As if that’d get her out, as if that’d show the way, until she gathered herself and rose in a huff, because there was no getting out if she did not move.

There were small spaces between the trees like roads, where Sarah could walk down. She had about five options, but simply wandered down the road right in front of her. She couldn’t tell you why she did.

The whispers didn’t stop, but she was so shaken that they seemed quieter under thumping anxiety. And she began to notice things. Things one doesn’t often see in “normal” forests. Like bright purple mushrooms glowing beneath her feet. Or a family of deer just sitting, watching her walk by. Of which she’d usually jump at, but this time kept it moving, not feeling that fear she’d expect to feel. And she kept moving, worried, weary, but moving.

Head swirling all around her as if at a gallery because she felt she was seeing art. Through trees she saw a sky of dancing stars, so many of them swishing by, begging her to make a wish, and so she did, in passing, still walking, as nonchalantly as someone making a note to themselves to wash the dishes when they got home.

But then she felt, beneath the ground, a rumble. She froze once again, wanting to grab onto one of these giant trees but hesitating, like the tree were alive and breathing and requesting she ask first, so she did.

“Can I lean on you?” She whispered, like the whispers between her ears, and the tree said yes. Louder than anything else she heard. So she leaned on the tree, then hugged it as the ground rumbled even more; then there was no rumble but a quake, opening the earth beneath her. Right in the middle of this path she’d chosen.

Sarah ran. Thought no more of this tree or these whispers. She ran far away from the crack in this earth’s foundation. Unsure of what else to do. Until she ran so hard and aimless that she hit the face of another tree. This time a giant one, way more giant than the others, causing her to fall to the ground.

The whispers grew louder, the earth still rumbled. She was shaky but not too shaky to rise up again and get to running, far, far away until, “Stop!”

Oh, and she did. Eyes closed now, as if when she opened them, she’d be back in her own room. No luck. That same voice, like sweet maple, smooth and dark, spoke, “Be still.”

And so she did, and she noticed it was behind her, coming from that giant tree. The one that stood way bigger than the rest. She obeyed it. It seemed the right thing to do.

“Now listen," said the tree.

“Listen?” Sarah thought. Listen to these mumbles in my ear? Listen to this rumble in the ground? Listen?

But she ignored such doubts and quieted every part of herself. Listened, listened. Listened.

For a moment, she only heard that whispering gumbo. Then more moments, and more. And more. And more! She grew impatient, tried closing her eyes again, this time to block out the glowing plants shooting stars in the sky. She stood there, eyes closed, listening, for a long, long time until those whispers became one sound. One lone bustling voice saying, “Keep moving, Sarah. Go back to where you came. You know the way out.”

She shook her head. There’s no way she knew her way out of this, no way she knew. But again the voice said the same, “You know the way.”

She stood there, wondering, doubting. But what did she have to lose? Not moving would be nowhere. Turning around would be moving, but it scared her. So she moved ahead, like the voice said.

Walking towards a gash in the earth, slowly but surely. The closer she got, seeing something that wasn’t there before. It confused her, but still she walked. Until she was right back there, where somehow, a bridge had appeared over the break in the ground. A bridge! So she walked some more over it, and in the direction it guided her. The voice still assuring her, “You know the way.”

She kept walking, much slower now, each step like its own answer to a question she didn’t even have to ask out loud. “You know the way.”

And she walked and walked right to her window, wide open, waiting for her to climb inside back into her room, where this all began. Baffled beyond belief, she dared herself to turn around. That forest was gone! No Swing, no Springwood. Not one forest in sight. Only her neighbor’s home, dark under the night sky but just as familiar as always.

How? No one could tell her, but in her gut she knew... she knew.

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Alright everybody! I hope you enjoyed this journey. Feel free to share it, or share your thoughts in the comments.

Where does Sarah go next? What will her mother say when she reveals she’s been to Swing? Or, does she already know? All questions I’m playing with, of which I may share here one day. But I also love the idea of a story that ends but isn’t truly over.

In the meantime, I hope you’re finding whimsy and/or pockets of joy in the wake of early spring.

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Talk soon,

Jasper

When I was a child, I wanted to be grown. All of 12 years old and I longed for 19, just a touch above 18, as if they made me some kinda big dog. And so in my youth, I told myself I didn’t like children’s books. Avoided them, found them oh-so-rudimentary. Then I was actually grown, with little niblings of my own and I began to consider good books I might share with them, realizing that I might have actually deprived myself of something special way back when.

This year, I have opened my mind to the magic of children’s books. Of the expansive worlds welcoming young, imaginative minds. And what a wonderful initiation into this world I found in LeVar Burton’s The Rhino Who Swallowed the Storm.

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The Rhino Who Swallowed the Storm

Did you know our beloved LeVar Burton wrote a children’s book called The Rhino Who Swallowed the Storm? It’s been on my radar since it’s release over a decade ago, but of course, “I don’t read children’s books.”

A while ago, I’d added it to a list for one of my several little niblings with plans to buy it on a birthday, or a holiday, or some special time they didn’t expect. I never did. Something in me said, “Hold on.” Perhaps my subconscious was waiting until a time I appreciated these books just as much as they might.

Friends, that time has arrived.

I checked it out at my local library along with another book for kids…but this one, in particular, has lingered in my mind. In it, a dear little mouse named Mica is afraid. There is a storm booming late in the night and last year, a similar storm destroyed her entire home.

“I’m scared, Papa,” she says. So Papa Mouse tells her a tale of Little Rhinoceros who lived long, long ago, “before there were words…”

At first, Little Rhinoceros was so happy. He loved his home, his friends, his life.

Then a great storm threatened his entire world. Little Rhinoceros witnessed turmoil right before his very eyes as it began to demolish everything in it’s wake. Pain and sorrow all around as his friends and family struggled to stay alive. He worried, and he panicked, and then this Rhino swallowed up the entire storm to save everyone else.

Shortly thereafter, he found himself in hollowed earth, trapped inside with a live storm in his belly.

What to do, he wondered.

Then a spider appeared, told him that he was not alone. That he must trust his friends; allow them to pull him from the hole he’d found himself in. Success! He was released but still heavy, full of the storm and foggy in the brain because of it.

Bees told him, “After every dark night, there comezzz a new day. Beee kind, do your best, and you’ll find a way…”

And so he trusted his friends again and again: a tortoise helped him through the mud, and a kangaroo, and when he cried out the storm and it became a sea, a whale carried him on its back to solid land.

Finally, Little Rhinoceros was free. Light and airy again with no storm in his body, and his friends were safe and well. He was a hero. But he never could have succeeded without the loving care from his community.

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Here we are now, in 2025. Just the sound of the year between your ears might cause a stir. But this year cannot be a year wrapped in loneliness. In siloed existences as if we are each living this life alone. Impossible.

I’m reminded of Ubuntu, an African philosophy that tells us, I am because you are. European philosophies, white supremacist philosophies, tell us, “We think, therefore we are.” But dare I say that’s just not enough. It can’t be. It never was.

“I” cannot be without you, nor “you” without me. And as these little storms live within all of us this year and beyond, Burton reminds us we may look outside ourselves for community. For a collective, imaginative new. New something.

I have no idea what our new world will look like, but I know without a shadow of a doubt it requires all of us with a desire for something better to be together.

I should have known Uncle LeVar would come all the way through with A Word. And I’m sure there are other messages this big and loving, with words simple enough for all to understand, that exist in some other, unassuming children’s book.

Please, if you know of one, drop it in the comments for the people.

I hope you all find your people or, at the very least, feel connected through our collective dream for a better tomorrow.

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Before I go, I’d like to share an essay I wrote almost two years ago. A version of it was scheduled to be in a ~major publication~ and then nixed at the last minute with no real explanation. But it’s truth still reverberates for me. Perhaps it will speak to you as well…

Bless y’all. I hope you find pockets of peace and joy… until we meet again.

Jasper

Good morning-evening-afternoon,

Welcome and hello! I hope you’re all feeling that refreshing relief of a new year. I am, and as of this very moment—can’t nobody tell me nothing. This year, delusion is a virtue. Resilience, a weapon. Love is my gift.

And friends, I do come bearing gifts. Well, a gift in the form of a documentary, of which I had the pleasure to experience towards the tail end of 2024.

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“I was born but never lived.”

This painfully poignant sentence is the very first written in singer and fascinating trans pioneer Jackie Shane's memoir, featured in the documentary Any Other Way: The Jackie Shane Story.

I learned of this film from an internet friend. I’m so grateful to have caught it’s brief virtual IFC screening because I am forever changed. I hope the film will be available more broadly soon, so that you might also be moved.

The Jackie Shane Story follows the life of singer Jackie Shane, a Black trans woman born in Nashville, TN, in 1940, whose momentous career in the 60s became essentially erased before her loving nieces, Andrenee Majors-Douglas and Vonnie Crawford-Moore—featured in the film—discovered her existence.

Jackie Shane literally tells her own story. The film follows both her memoir—found in her home following her death—along with a rare, recorded interview she did later in life. She’s played by fellow trans women, drag performer Makayla Couture and the iconic elder Sandra Caldwell. Shane’s lovingly portrayed in all her glamorous splendor, from her elegant and show-stopping gowns to her mesmerizing voice and unforgettably charismatic performances.

Shane opened for The Temptations, was featured on the popular show “Night Train,” and was even supposed to perform on the infamous Ed Sullivan show, only to decline when they demanded she tone down her femininity if she were to be on camera.

Shane was well on her way to international stardom, similar to her friend and fellow performer Little Richard. But, right before her immenent rise, our dear transcestor chose her own peace over a life in the spotlight where she’d be constantly and sometimes violently misunderstood.

Her later years were spent inside her own home, only exiting once a month to gather her basic needs. I empathize with Shane’s desire for reclusion. It was self-preservation. A thing so many of us who are marginalized in some way experience, especially Black trans women. Jackie Shane was born but never lived. She existed. She survived and wrote her own story so we may continue telling it. And we must.

She passed quietly in her home in 2019 at the age of 78, found only days later by her close friend, Lorenzo Washington.

Jackie Shane’s 1969 work “Any Other Way” was nominated for Best Historical Album in 2017.

I’m grateful that at least towards the end of her life she was able to experience the love and reverence she deserved the whole time. Though she wasn’t able to perform one final time, she is now known by family who would have loved her deeply, and her impact and influence live on. People like you and I may still listen to her voice, her music, and her story. And how iconic is it that her story is the one she told?

I hope she felt loved in the end. I really do.

I’m so grateful that we get to know her by her own words. I hope we can all be inspired by Jackie Shane’s story and her existence.

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It is a new year. For those of us who have survived, I hope we live so loud we cannot be erased—loud enough to live for those who couldn’t. I hope we love ourselves. I hope we show those we love that we love them. I hope we know we deserve it all (see: Kendrick’s ‘Man in the Garden’).

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I’ll leave you with a recording of Jackie Shane’s single, “Any Other Way.”

Happy new year, y’all. See you soon,

Jasper

Today marks almost exactly one month since the release of my memoir, PANSY! A few highlights since its release:

• I dug into my writing journey and thinking behind PANSY in Q&A with .

• I was interviewed by Bold Journey Magazine and my local newspaper, The Memphis Flyer (seen in image below).

• Publisher Weekly’s BookLife named my book one of the BEST OF 2024! SHOOK.

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Separately, I was named Headliner 901’s Trans Person of the Year?! Memphis, mane. I love my community and our commitment to constantly be in each other’s corners. Cheering, loving, and advocating for each other.

I’m grateful. Beyond grateful; I am overwhelmed and I hope that my overwhelming gratitude flows right back into my city. For Memphis to be a part of Tennessee—a state with laws and leaders so antithetical to our people, and that love—is wild. But we got each other, so we ‘gone be alright.

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This four-year project was a labor of love and admittedly has consumed much of my time since its inception. I am now allowing myself some rest and rejuvenation before jumping into my next major project. What does that look like, you ask?

Well. Sitting. Staring at the wall. Watching my ‘lil shows, reading books that have absolutely nothing to do with research, and exploring Substack again! Y’all, when I tell you my ‘saved’ folder on this app is longer than a CVS receipt?!

It’s so satisfying to scroll through this list and finally, finally explore the many musings and profound essays on this site. I’ll highlight just a few…

Some posts I’ve recently enjoyed

shared a wonderfully poetic ode to Audre Lorde’s philosophies on the erotic. It’s accompanied by ’s soothing voice over the most peaceful ambient music.

Love + Travel

Thank the (Audre) Lorde for the Erotic

Welcome to Love + Travel – or welcome back if you're here for your weekly adventure fix…

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2 years ago · 73 likes · 36 comments · Rachel Leeke

is a friend of mine who happens to be a dope DJ and who runs two radio shows on bff.fm: What’s the Moooove, and Fervency, which goes hand-in-hand with her newsletter of the same name. The post below is about when you stumble on music by artists you love right at that very moment that you need it.

Fervency

Sometimes it finds you when you need it.

Sometimes albums are meant to find you, you’re not supposed to find them. I have to tell myself that when it nears the end of the year and the musician that I said I loved dropped a new project 7 months ago and I had no idea…

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2 years ago · Hellena Handbasket

Every time I’ve been able to make ’s weekly writing session has been a highlight. I highly, highly recommend following their newsletter . So many phenomenal writers share their work there each month, as chosen by the Locked In community. I find myself being inspired by at least one of them every time, like ’ short essay on “ugly” fruits and veggies (also featuring some great recipes!).

Unlocked: BIPOC Reads

Issue #05: Unlocked

Unlocked is a monthly selection of content from Locked In, an unofficial BIPOC writing community on Substack. Each month’s issue will be curated by a different Locked In member, chosen from a monthly call for members to share posts that they’re most proud of. If you identify as BIPOC…

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2 years ago · 32 likes · 11 comments

Thank you all for your continued support and love. And thank you to all of the featured writers for your writing that feeds our minds and moves us!

See y’all soon,

Jasper

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This is surreal. I am writing out words I’ve anticipated for four years now—Pansy: A Black American Memoir is officially out now!

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I’m truly overwhelmed with gratitude and I want to thank you all for journeying with me.

Thanks to all of you who’ve requested ARCS, left reviews, and who have reached out to me to share your thoughts on this project. Thank you to the few and mighty IndieGoGo contributors and to all of you who posted comments here to express your excitement. I’m super grateful to DeMoir Books & Things in Memphis, who sponsored and facilitated an amazing PANSY signing and Q&A this past weekend. And to all of my Memphis people who showed up!

Thank you to fellow Substackers , of Rooted Magazine and who’ve featured PANSY in their newsletters.

PANSY’s official publication date was yesterday, October 22nd. This means you can get this book just about anywhere online, and in a few select indie bookstores around the US and UK.

You can also check out PANSY on Libby, a free app that allows users to borrow and read digital media from your local library.

Oh! And look out for the audiobook version of PANSY—it’s set to release early next year.

What folks are saying about PANSY:

A tenderly honest, endearingly witty mosaic of stories and poems. - Sabrina Imbler, HOW FAR THE LIGHT REACHES

A captivating ode to the constant work of becoming—and ​understanding—oneself. PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

This heartwarming and heartbreaking memoir is a must read.
THE LESBIAN LIBRARY

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Some ways to help PANSY thrive:

• Buy it—for yourself or a friend (or a bookclub)! Paperback, hardcover, and/or e-books are available now. Highly recommend purchasing at an indie spot if you can. (Audiobook incoming so stay tuned!).

• Leave a review. If you enjoy PANSY, please let the world know at whatever public review site of your choice—even if that’s your personal blog. Maybe you'll introduce someone new to this indie book.

• Ask your library to carry it. Check out your local library’s website or go in person to recommend PANSY. You can also do this for e-book copies through Libby.

• Recommend it to your local bookstore. Same as with the library, indie bookstores are often eager to support indie works.

• Tell your friends. Word-of-mouth is still the best way to get the word out about books. If you like PANSY, or you know of someone who might—tell them!

• Donate (Cashapp: @blkpansy) I’m hoping to do a mini-book tour and will also be submitting PANSY to a few select competitions over the next few months. Submission fees are high (as they’re typically meant for major publishers), so whatever you can donate helps.

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Again, thank you all for your love, care, and support. I’m doing my best to savor this moment before I delve into my next project (which will be a fantasy, btw 😛).

Warmly,

Jasper “Jaz” Joyner

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Hello. How are you?

I am alive
I hurt, however
friend. I have (good) news.

This is a hopeful story with a positive end. However, there is mention of suicidal ideation. Please be advised and refrain from reading if you need to. You are loved, and there is help: non-carceral resources »>

Lately, I have crept in low spaces where I am crouched down and it’s hard to see. Scrunched up into ugly form not worthy of my existence.

As I stand, there is a glint of light. I squint, and my muscles cramp and I move, move, slowly, out into a higher place. I can see clearly now though it hurts.

Here, I meet someone who loves me like I’ve known them forever. Our paths have crossed before, though I’d not recognized them until this day. This someone sees my wholeness. My ugly form and my beauty and my everything. I would like to befriend this someone, this someone who loves me.

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This friend is loud and fearless, joyful and strong. They’re gorgeous, grounded—therapist-approved. And I am still getting to know them. The more I know, the more I love.

It’s National Suicide Prevention Month in the U.S. This Monday, I shared a poem from my forthcoming memoir Pansy with one of my favorite newsletters, about my history and realities with this sullen ideation.

Rooted Magazine

Like a Kick in the Face

Today, we share a poem by Jasper Joyner, along with an excerpt from Pansy: A Black American Memoir, their forthcoming debut memoir. Pansy is a non-linear, episodic memoir that combines poetry, cultural criticism, and essays. It follows transmasc, southern writer Jasper as they fumble through an awkward Memphis upbringing in the 90s and early aughts, an …

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2 years ago · 5 likes · Jasper Joyner

This post is dedicated to all who’ve lived, stumbled into, or found themselves trapped in any sort of these low places. I hope that you, too, meet a friend within yourself who helps pull all of your pieces out and back together again. I’m coming out very slowly but also know that I might return here again. Hopefully next time my friend will find me real quick, or go yell at my demons to move out the damn way. A lifelong advocate in this valiant struggle to thrive.

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I’ll leave you all with this poem I like to share, at least quarterly, by Langston Hughes:

“Folks, I'm telling you, birthing is hard and dying is mean-so get yourself a little loving in between.”

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PRE-ORDER PANSY: A BLACK AMERICAN MEMOIR

Hark, it’s Leo season!

I fail to know much at all about zodiac signs, or astrology, or Leos, as the stereotype suggests. Instead, I spend far too much time claiming I’m the least Leo of them all… a perhaps unironically Leo-esque pastime.

But alas, ten plus years of a minor (major) mane-obsession and I must confess, I am she. Truly, is there anything more lion than a love of thine fro?

Let us travel back, way back, to the beginning of this obsession, shall we?

I am in my early 20s.

My hair is big and long. I begin taking testosterone, like medicine. I go on it and off it like somebody on Zyrtec with seasonal allergies. I embrace the flexibility of my aesthetic. It works for me.

Years pass. I shave my head. As I try and grow it back, I spot the murmurs of male-patterened baldness. I am not male. I find this jarring. I keep it short.

Later, I try again to grow it big and long like before. My strands laugh at me as they fall to the floor. I miss flexibility—no more chameleon.

I stop T for a while this time. Many months. Almost years.

Slowly, slowly, my hair returns.

It’s 2024.

My mane has reached a point of pride again. Thin spots, bald spot, spots that speak to my searching for peace, linger.

I find a braider, a Black gay man whose skillful designs are absolutely divine. I care to adorn my hair again. Celebrate this new era.

I arrive for my appointment and I show him a photo. “I’m thinking something like this but I’m open. Just something cute that stays for a minute.”

"I got you!” he says as he hands me a Corona.

We joke with his sister and her partner, who take turns under a dryer as they set freshly retwisted locs.

Then he pauses.

“Is this a stress spot for you?” he asks.

No. It’s a remnant of male-patterned baldness in the middle of my head. Of all my thinning areas, I worry this spot may never grow in full.

“Nah, I been on and off T,” I say. “I think it’s growing back. Slowly.”

He nods. Unplaits what he’s started as he shares some remedies with me:

Aloe vera on the scalp directly from the plant.
Moisture daily.
Drink water.

I feel him braiding a different pattern now. How easily he adapts. Somehow our conversation trails playfully off into his last hookup with some man he met on the apps.

“This n____ tryna meet me at this gay bar, you been?” He asks.

We laugh about the bar and this man and other men as he parts my hair into something new. It is a different pattern than my reference. Something that suits me as I am now.

He keeps braiding.

I feel safe in this salon chair. I’m reminded of my grandma’s living room, where cousin Ashely used to cornrow me into Lil Bow Wow’s twin. I remember what it feels like to be transformed, as if I’ve ever stopped transforming.

I return to this room where I am elastic. And my hair will continue to thin and my body continue to age but even then, I’ll be flexible. I will adapt like my braider, an artist. A great collaborator with time.

I sip on my Corona and we kiki, and he tells me he is done. He hands me a mirror and I smile to myself because I am a Leo and this is my mane. Why else would I want to cry over some braids?

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Pansy: A Black American Memoir updates:

• You can now preorder PANSY (paperback, ebook, and hardcover)!

• I’m working on an audiobook version! Very excited to share that hopefully on the pub date (Oct. 22nd). Or a ‘lil bit thereafter 🤭. Stay tuned.

• E-book ARCs are still available. HMU at jaz@jazjoyner.com if you’re interested.

• Finally, be sure to follow me on Goodreads for PANSY updates and reviews.

p.s.: WHAT IS IT, THE BRAIDS?
See y’all in September.

Jasper

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Hiii everybody,

I am writing to you from a very crowded room in my mind. I have cleared a little corner, found an end table, and pen, and notebook, and I am writing to you standing up. Squeezed between books stacked to the ceiling full of ideas and plans and events all surrounding my forthcoming book, PANSY: A BLACK AMERICAN MEMOIR.

I did not write to you all last month. I could not find space to do so, and I also did not have news to share that I had hoped I could share. But this month I do have a little space, and I do have a little surprise. Please scroll down for more…

It’s my hardcover reveal! I designed it, just like my paperback version. I’ve been having fun living my graphic design fantasy but don’t get any ideas—yer boi is not a designer. Just a cutie with taste, creativity, and a Canva Pro subscription. Don’t you love it?!

I will soon return to the other corners of my mind to finish up these last few months of this PANSY rollout. Coming at you live on October 22, 2024. I just wanted to stop by and say hello. I am alive; I am around. I am figuring things out. Just a few more things below and I’mma let y’all go.

Some other flowery things:

• Publishers Weekly called PANSY “a captivating ode to the constant work of becoming—and understanding—oneself.”

• ARC’s are available now! Thanks to many of you in my wonderful Substack community who I’ve already been in contact with. If you haven’t received an email for this, feel free to reach out.

• Feel free to follow my author page on Goodreads in prep for my book’s release.

• You can still read the intro and excerpt from PANSY.

Thanks for reading, friends.

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Talk to you soon,

Jasper

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