Resist With Every Inch and Every Breath

By Dan Michael Fielding

Resist With Every Inch and Every Breath was a phrase first spoken by Riot Grrrl zine makers in interviews with sociologist Kristen Schilt. As a phrase, it perfectly captures the spirit of resistance that has sustained so many activists across so many movements. In the face of overwhelming unequal and discriminatory structures there are those who stand up and commit their lives to make change.

This collection of twelve poems and stories asks us to think deeply about resistance big and small. In this anthology we look to the present and future of resistance and ask: What does it mean to fight for the last inch of freedom? What does it mean to fight until the last breath our body holds?

With stories contributed by D L Lang, Jefferson Retallack, Kate Pashby, Katherine Sinback, Catherine A. Lee, T.B. Grennan, Marsheila Rockwell, Laura J. Campbell, M. Kelly Peach, Octavia Cade, Beulah Vega, and Molly Thynes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lonely Cryptid Media
• Release date: May 1, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005648480

Book preview

Chapters

Editor’s Introduction by Dan Michael Fielding

What Is to Be Gained by D L Lang

Effects of Symphonic Burning on Leeward Communities by Jefferson Retallack

Tlatelolco by Kate Pashby

Sisterhood is Powerful by Katherine Sinback

Work Song Cadence: Prison Industrial Complex by Catherine Lee

The Golden Age by T.B. Grennan

The Bones On Which They Cut Their Teeth by Marsheila Rockwell

Fly High, Michelle by Laura J. Campbell

Ubbits by M. Kelly Peach

The Stone Weta by Octavia Cade

Arrogance by Beulah Vega

TrueToy by Molly Thynes

Authors

Editor’s Introduction

By Dan Michael Fielding

Resist With Every Inch and Every Breath was a phrase first spoken by Riot Grrrl zine makers in interviews with sociologist Kristen Schilt. As a phrase, it perfectly captures the spirit of resistance that has sustained so many activists across so many movements. In the face of overwhelming unequal and discriminatory structures, there are those who stand up and commit their lives to making change.

The first call for submissions to this anthology came as the world entered into a global pandemic. The face of resistance changed dramatically as a result. While structures of violence used this opportunity to perpetuate anti-science sentiment, concentrate power in the hands of a few, and double down on anti-Black and anti-Asian racism, those who resist these powers had to think creatively. Scientists found themselves newly awakened to the political aspects of their work. People who had toiled their lives away suddenly got a taste of the illusive free time. Those trapped in essential jobs had to learn to stick together against the forces that would exhaust and demean them, lest they go up in a flame to big to be termed burn out.

This collection of twelve poems and stories asks us to think deeply about resistance big and small. In this anthology we look to the present and future of resistance and ask: What does it mean to fight for the last inch of freedom? What does it mean to fight until the last breath our body holds?

What Is to Be Gained

By D L Lang

In a world without capitalism, you wouldn’t come to work

in an evacuation zone during poor air quality

during a power outage during a pandemic,

but capitalism doesn’t care that an emergency has been declared!

In a world without capitalism, we would have free access to all we need,

but capitalism profits from tragedy—the purchase of extra supplies,

food that was spoiled, and homes lost in fires—

price gouging on necessities while producing objects of frivolity!

In a world without capitalism the stability of the people would come before profit.

Capitalism pays its shareholders rather than giving workers a living wage,

putting the delivery of goods above the health of drivers,

leaving the poor unfed as food rots on the shelves.

In a world without capitalism no one would go hungry, unsheltered, nor unclothed.

While people stand in food lines, capitalism destroys food to fix prices,

leaving people sleeping in the streets while houses stand empty.

It lets the rich hoard wealth and goods that were meant for you and me.

In a world without capitalism the sick would receive free healthcare.

Capitalism endangers us by shutting down power, water,

and communication without a thought for the disabled people of our nation.

Competition is no longer friendly when workers are a dime a dozen,

willing to sacrifice your family members’ health for profit,

because capitalism doesn’t care about the common folks’ situation.

Capitalism says it’s every man for himself with no room for co-operation.

If we rid ourselves of capitalism, there will be a world for us all to share.

A system built upon slavery, exploitation, and discrimination

shall not withstand the test of time when the clock strikes revolution!

Effects of Symphonic Burning on Leeward Communities

by Jefferson Retallack

Dr. B.D. Fallet was, having penned another politely firm letter, in a state of well-earned hopefulness. Surely this time she would change C.G. Costello’s mind. Spending more than preferable for termite-repellent coating, the letter would at least reach him.

Walking the long walk home, from the cheapest post office this side of the Harmonic Ranges—the one by the Diminished Interval’s only train station—doubt found time to crawl up Fallet’s spine, sitting unwanted upon her shoulder.

Nothing will change their minds. You’ll never change his.

Had her word choice been too forceful this time? Too passionate? Or was her imposter syndrome to be trusted.

Why would the world’s most famous musician stop making music just because some poor old scientist told him to?

Distracted, she stepped in a cluster of termite excrement. The shimmering arpeggio of notes, like shattering glass perfectly in key, silenced her negative thoughts.

Yuck. Unthinking, she used her sleeve to brush the sour-smelling crystals from her boot before they took permanent hold.

Thinking, she remembered her lecture. No time to change clothes. That’s what you get for daydreaming.

Fallet picked up her pace. Her award-winning paper, Effects of Symphonic Burning on Leeward Communities, was likely too advanced for the teenaged class to fully grasp. But if she could impress its importance upon one young mind, today could still be a great day.

C.G. Costello was, following his matinee performance, in a state of well-deserved ecstasy. The soprano willow’s piercing crescendo—lithe branches whipping, aflame—lingered. Already, he pictured sparkling reviews. Concert of the season. Another awards contender.

He hummed the refrain as the lily rail pulled up at his balcony. Nothing could extinguish his high spirits. Not even the bonsai-tall pile of fan mail—nine tenths from symphs no doubt—amassed in the hours since his rich and liquid breakfast. He would spare the time to answer some.

Fanning the envelopes out, he checked for any of note; his numerous, wealthy patrons were best not kept waiting.

Minor, minor, major, minor, major, and so on. Nothing from within the Perfect Interval.

Translation: nothing pressing.

He flopped the pile onto his recently installed marble breakfast-island before opening his drinks cabinet. As he poured himself a purpling blend of crimson, indigo, and obsidian spirits, a letter he had failed to notice stuck out like a lonely tritone.

Yuck. Without thinking, he had torn the sour-smelling envelope from the back of another. A strange glue clung to his fingertips like a symph. It must have been what allowed it to breach his assistant’s notice. He removed his jacket and, deciding he had grown bored of crushed velvet anyway, used it as a napkin before stuffing it into his garbage.

He found a utensil set he would not miss and used its forks to manipulate the letter.

The envelope was a hideous smear of recycled browns. It came from the outer intervals. Where else?

How dare they write him. And how dare someone deliver it to him at his home. The Postmaster will hear about this.

But not wanting to let a mistake, however egregious, augment his verve, Costello figured he could return it to its sender with an autograph, brightening their day, instead of binning it along with his jacket and their hopes. Upon study, the object had art brut appeal, even if a tree—sequoia, from the hints of amber—had been denied its song by the envelopes production.

Smooth handwriting gave some justice.

Perfect Interval.

So, it was destined for his neighborhood. Who would be in contact with such riff raff?

12 Soprano Boulevard.

Someone in his building! He would have stopped reading but for the opportunity to hold such humiliation over its designated recipient at the next owner’s association meeting.

His eyes moved sotto down the text. He wished he had been less eager to embarrass.

C.G. Costello.

Who beyond the Ranges dared contact him? Mortified, he tore open the envelope and cast it to a disappointingly silent oblivion within his fire.

Its contents read as follows:

Dear Mr. Costello,

I have written you, as fan, many times, but today it is with regret I reach out as asker of favors, and victim.

Your performances, while beautiful to the ears—and the eyes, of those lucky enough to witness them live—wreak havoc upon my home. Xylem sap, generated primarily by your industry, travels into the lower atmosphere where it billows down either side of the Harmonic Ranges.

In your direction, that sap simply washes away, reabsorbed by the lush vegetation on the wayward face of the range. But here, in the rain shadow, it dries and, once consumed then excreted by the termites—of the genus Macrotermes—infesting our intervals, forms an invasive crystalline substance clogging our machinery and, ultimately, our way of life.

My home without machines is yours without plants.

My most famous dissertation, Effects of Symphonic Burning on Leeward Communities, finds—

He read on, accelerando, keeping only words or phrases of import: cease, desist, and monster, but only if you ignore my plea.

The joy from his performance: muted. A bonfire—one not of music, but of rage—blazed within him. Barely able to believe he deigned communication with some...scientist from the outer intervals, he penned his response with a fury saved, without exception, for his performances.

Dear Nobody,

No.

Yours vehemently,

C.G. Costello.

Following Costello’s evening performance—retinue assured more triumphant than his matinee—he had condescended, with precisely enough resistance to appear won-over and not merely desperate, to allow some fans to join him at his home.

Please, make yourselves drunk and comfortable, he said, to the fawning symphs. After all, what better to dampen tempers than another body’s company? Three bodies. Tonight, with Fallet’s words dancing upon his shoulders, he hoped three would suffice.

But hours had passed, and thus sprouted another stack of mail.

Anger dulling his appetites, Costello needed a moment alone to relocate his confidence. I will be with you in a momento. Pile in hand, he snuck into his master bedroom’s opulent privacy, praying no reply to his earlier missive.

Prayer ignored, he read the reply to his seemingly unreceived answer.

Dear Mr. Costello,

I know what I dwell upon, and have done so for every hour of every day of much of my life, might seem insignificant to you, especially upon first learning such an awful truth. Do not think for a moment I cannot imagine how hard it would be for one so profoundly enwrapped in the world of symphonic burning, but I must again implore you to stop.

And, if you will not—or perhaps cannot—stop, I ask one thing. Visit us. See for yourself the impact your music is having on communities other than your own.

Yours earnestly,

Dr. B.D. Fallet

Dejected and flat, Costello returned to the merriment of others bouncing around his home. Despite the obvious enjoyment his alluring guests—the lone male of which was especially exquisite—were experiencing, he needed them to leave. There’s been a change of plans, he said, grave. Please, if you would.

They gave brief pause—briefer eye-contact—before continuing to enjoy themselves.

Costello’s eyes bulged. Get out, he boomed, voice breaking.

They complied and moved to the balcony where, before waiting for their lily pad to arrive, he shut its many doors and drew each blind, blocking all memory of their moment with him. They might deride him for it, sell their stunted fling with fame to the media, but like his Dr. Fallet, they too were nobodies compared to him.

Unlike them, though, he found Dr. Fallet impossible to forget.

Drunk and, as such, uninhibited, he wrote a new letter, confirming his plan to—a struggle to conceptualize—attend the outer intervals.

He studied the return address.

Diminished Interval.

Was he considering this? Visiting the least fortunate of all the less fortunate. Preposterous.

Vision struck him.

I could perform out there.

It had never been done. A spirit—half pioneering, half alcoholic—flushed his cheeks.

He would change lives. More than usual.

The economic boost his concert would bring to the area alone would be enough to make amends in full. He could even go so far as to not charge them for his services, further alleviating his guilt. He failed to include this plan in his reply, though; his music, his gift, would be all the greater as a surprise revelation to their ghetto.

Dear Mr. Fallet,

I accept your second offer of invitation and will see you in the morrow.

Yours patiently,

C.G. Costello.

Fallet waited at the train station. Along the tracks, a roiling green carpet of creeper flowed toward her from the tunnel’s mouth. Awe struck her.

Leeward people who saw a single plant throughout their lives were lucky. They rarely left their birth interval and termite control was prohibitively expensive. Besides, who had time and funds to spare travelling in today’s world?

The creeper was wasteful, sure, but what a marvel.

Fallet caught a whiff of pollen. The creeper’s ivory blossoms flared, slowing its progress. Strange. I can’t see his pad yet.

If the air-breaks had activated, the lily pad should have cleared the tunnel’s gloom by now. She dreaded Costello becoming stranded. Would he have to walk the final leg of the trip? Ugh, how embarrassing.

Though it continued to slow, it did not stop.

When her guest entered the scene, the creeper’s behavior became obvious. Momentum.

C.G. Costello, a figurehead, heralded an ostentatious procession of the most verdant, massive vegetation Fallet had ever seen. His arrival boggled.

Maybe this much green existed across the whole interval. Maybe. But for so much to be together before her…

Incredible.

Then, fanfare.

Tooooooot.

Upon the leading pad, several whistling tendrils flailed. They were trained to lock the pad in place upon the track and form a bannister. Fallet figured being on fire made them less able to perform their intended purpose. What a reckless exhibitionist.

The creeper reached the station, shuddered, and ceased all movement. Charred and unrestricted, the leading pad