John Madera

Author of NERVOSITIES (@AntiOedipusP) and NOMAD SCIENCE (Spuyten Duyvil). Editor of @BigOtherMag. Publicist at @RhizomaticPR. More at

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Delighted to share that NERVOSITIES, my debut collection of short fiction, was published today! Kapow! NERVOSITIES has received advance praise from some of the world's finest writers, e.g., Rikki Ducornet, Brian Evenson, Lance Olsen, Sam Lipsyte, Garielle Lutz, & Michael Martone.

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

I once again almost started a Substack on art, literary and otherwise, from the perspective of flight, refusal, and abolition, but I caught myself. Whew! Close one.

(Image: Julie Mehretu's Renegade Delirium, 2002)

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

"I dream of lost / vocabularies that might express some of what / we no longer can."
—Jack Gilbert

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

"And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet’s pen
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name."
—William Shakespeare, A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

"Not till we are lost, not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations."
—Henry David Thoreau

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

“Very little grows on jagged rock. Be ground. Be crumbled. So wildflowers will come up where you are. You have been stony for too many years. Try something different. Surrender.”
—Jalāl al-Dīn Muḥammad Rūmī

(Image: Joan Mitchell's Two Sunflowers (1980))

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Today's all-day soundtrack, of course!

https://t.co/cNY10iPrjc

#AnthonyBraxton

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Happy birthday, Allen Ginsberg!

https://t.co/3ZLIikglbq

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Love is never guilty.

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Received today: a signed copy of Maxine Chernoff's DIARY: POEMS (Quale Press). Thanks, Maxine!

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

“I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with their pain.”
―James Baldwin

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

"I do not fight fascists because I will win. I fight fascists because they are fascists."
—Chris Hedges

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

"No one really understands
the savagery of this place,
the way it kills people for no reason
just to keep in practice."
—from Louise Glück's "Pastoral"

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Every month is Pride Month. Happy Pride Month!

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Every month is Immigrant Heritage Month! Happy Immigrant Heritage Month!

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

"'Communication' only takes place between two people who risk themselves, each lacerated and suspended, perched atop a common nothingness."
—George Bataille

(Image: René Magritte's The Lovers, 1928)

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Wherein James W. Fuerst reads from DISTRESS CRIES OF ANIMALS (Spaceboy Books), a Finalist for the 2025 @BigOtherMag Book Award for Fiction!

https://t.co/yCLuse9Vjd

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Wherein Madeline McDonnell reads from LONESOME BALLROOM (@RescuePress), a Finalist for the 2025 @BigOtherMag Book Award for Fiction!

https://t.co/D3XmCD8Q1s

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Wherein Craig Bernardini reads from 12 OXEN UNDER THE SEA (New American Press), a Finalist for the 2025 @BigOtherMag Book Award for Fiction!

https://t.co/0phC2Q1HEG

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Wherein Brady Harrison reads from A JOURNEY TO AL RAMEL (@TwelveWinters Press), a Finalist for the 2025 @BigOtherMag Book Award for Fiction!

https://t.co/C6NKlZcPFe

[John Madera @aredamnhoj]

Wherein Michael Loughran reads from WINDOWER (@CSUPoetryCenter), a Finalist for the 2025 @BigOtherMag Book Award for Nonfiction!

https://t.co/PfaEJnc8id