Kate Beall
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katebbeall.bsky.social
Kate Beall
@katebbeall.bsky.social
510 followers 420 following 1.2K posts
Writer, baker, candlestick maker (?), / All of me out to sea | Words in Feral, HAD, and elsewhere | she/her

https://linktr.ee/kate_writes
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katebbeall.bsky.social
Ana Luísa Amaral, “A verdade histórica,” translated by Margaret Jull Costa as “The Historical Truth”
A VERDADE HISTÓRICA A minha filha partiu uma tigela na cozinha. E eu que me apetecia escrever sobre o evento, tive que pôr de lado inspiração e lápis, pegar numa vassoura e varrer a cozinha. A cozinha varrida de tigela ficou diferente da cozinha de tigela intacta: local propício a escavação e estudo, curto mapa arqueológico num futuro remoto. Uma tigela de louça branca com flores, restos de cereais tratados em embalagem estanque espalhados pelo chão. Não eram grão de trigo de Pompeia, mas eram respeitosos cereais de qualquer forma. E a tigela, mesmo não sendo da dinastia Ming, mas das Caldas, daqui a cinco ou dez mil anos devia ter estatuto admirativo. Mas a hecatombe deu-se. E escorregada de pequeninas mãos, ficou esquecida de famas e proveitos, varrida de vassouras e memórias. Por mísero e cruel balde de lixo azul em plástico moderno (indestrutível) The Historical Truth My daughter broke a bowl in the kitchen. And when I fancied writing a poem about the incident I had to put aside inspiration and pen, pick up a broom and sweep the kitchen floor. The kitchen swept clean of the broken bowl looked different from the kitchen with the bowl intact: a place ready to be excavated and studied a brief archeological map of a remote future. A white china bowl decorated with flowers, the remnants of processed cereal in watertight wrapping scattered on the floor. They weren't grains of wheat from Pompeii but respectable cereals nonetheless. And the bowl, although not exactly Ming dynasty, but made in Caldas da Rainha, in five or ten thousand years should find its own admiring audience. But disaster struck. And having slipped from those small hands, the bowl, achieving neither fame nor advantage, was swept up by brooms and memories Into a miserable cruel blue bin in modern (indestructible) plastic
November 21, 2025 at 11:55 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Hey you can memorize and recite a poem even if you’re not in David’s course. And you could do it in any language!

Here’s Ana Luísa Amaral’s “A verdade histórica” (text and translation in replies)
November 21, 2025 at 11:55 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
“I am out with lanterns, looking for my salad,” as I believe Emily Dickinson wrote
A solar lantern above some hardy little lettuce and arugula plants, electric green among brown fallen leaves.
November 17, 2025 at 2:07 AM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Maria Zoccola, HELEN OF TROY, 1993
#smallpoemsunday
about the affair from my place in his bed, the trees in the side yard burst into red and gold beacons as if some nymph or muse pulled them leaf by leaf from the hot folds of her body. it was always this way, for me. the blazing went on until the dark came, and the dark went on for much longer than that.
November 16, 2025 at 10:28 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
This linocut print by Eduardo Robledo, called “Diablos, seguimos.”
“Diablos, seguimos,” Eduardo Robledo, 2020. A linocut print in shades of plummy, pinky purples with robin’s egg blue or maybe seafoam highlights. A large, rectangular figure with horns draped in an ornate fabric, from which protrudes a slim tail. Fishes emerge from his shoulders. He points a heart impaled on a stick towards his mouth, pointed tongue reaching to meet it. Within or on top of his torso: a songbird and a chicken squawk their tongues at each other around another, central heart; a figure in a devilish mask rides a unicycle; a skeleton strums a guitar, song curling from his mouth; also, more fish. The rectangular figure rides an armadillo on rockers, like a child’s toy horse.
November 14, 2025 at 3:37 AM
katebbeall.bsky.social
northern lights were just one magic among many today
Blue and black striped blue jay feather in a tangle of dry grass. Two piñon seeds, smooth and fat and evenly burnished in browns and golds, in a pink, lined palm. Exquisitely lined glob of sap mounted atop a piñon pine needle. Northern lights: a wiggly light green shape over the horizon topped with a brilliant pink haze in the starred sky.
November 12, 2025 at 6:32 AM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Started a novel today. All I could think is, “man, good thing they’re not baking with these pears.” 🍐 💦 👀
Cover image of The Safekeep, A Novel (Yael Van Der Wouden). Two pears in silky bright light. One leans toward the other, down which a droplet of liquid runs. Isabel touched the back of a chair, took her hand away again. She said, "Yes." There was another pear, left in the middle of the table, propped like a statue. Eva said, "I got one for you, too." Just the one. Not a bag of pears, or several for the fruit basket. Just the two: one for her, one for Isabel. I don't want it, Isabel wanted to say. She said, "Thank you." She took the pear. Put it in her pocket. Eva looked amused. "You won't eat it?" "Later," Isabel said, and then, with a few aborted movements, fled upstairs. In her bedroom, Isabel — sitting on the edge of her bed-held the pear in the cup of her hands. If she'd eat it now, she'd have to go downstairs to throw away the pits, the core. If she ate it later, Eva might walk by, see her eat it. She did not want Eva to see her eat it. She could throw the whole thing away. She could open the window and throw it away. [highlighted] It was a water-heavy fruit, full-ripe. The first bite spilled on Isabel's skirt. It wouldn't show: the fabric was brown, checkered. There was no way of eating it in silence-the sounds it made, the wet. [end highlight] Isabel ate through the whole thing: the flesh and stick and pits and core and all. She made sure nothing was left of it, as though it had never been given in the first place. Her arms were dripping. Wet all around her mouth. She had to wash her face in the basin afterward. The spot on her skirt where the fruit had stained remained throughout the day, a cloying brush to the back of her hand.
October 24, 2025 at 3:24 AM
katebbeall.bsky.social
the trend continues
Little Movements, by Lauren Morrow (the book’s cover is various shades of purple with hot pink type), pictured with a pink orchid flower.
September 26, 2025 at 12:08 AM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Particularly unified color palette in the “currently reading” department today 💕🌸💖
A pink geranium and a cream/blue/pink coffee cup preside over a collection of books, all of which feature various shades of pink: Pattern-Book, Éireann Lorsung Norteña: Authentic Family Recipes from the North of Mexico, Karla Zazueta There Are Reasons for This, Nini Berndt Automatic Noodle, Annalee Newitz The Sky Was Once a Dark Blanket, Kinsale Drake Heresies, Alina Stefanescu
September 25, 2025 at 5:06 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Mediocre showing atxthe supermarket this morning, but I am intrigued about “America’s Dairy Band”
Blue car with a bumper sticker in the style of a license plate: Wisconsin BOOGIE America’s Dairy Band
September 22, 2025 at 6:09 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Paloma versus the many things I have to do today.

Paloma is winning
A tabby gazing toward the camera from atop of the human she forced to lie down on the couch. Her claws are in the human, but only a little bit, just to make her point.
September 22, 2025 at 4:38 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Emily Dickinson for #smallpoemsunday
955 I sing to use the Waiting, My Bonnet but to tie And shut the Door unto my House No more to do have I Till His best step approaching We journey to the Day And tell each other how We sung To keep the Dark away. 808 The lovely flowers embarrass me, They make me regret I am not a Bee -
September 22, 2025 at 12:49 AM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Humberto Ak’abal (tr. @mikhailbazharov.bsky.social) // Emily Dickinson
ESTALLÓ Estalló tu silencio y despertaste al loco que dormía en mi cabeza. Empecé a buscarte por esos caminos apagados. Me dicen que te volviste flor, me dicen que te volviste miel. Por tu culpa siento que soy abeja. RUPTURE Your silence exploded and awakened the madman sleeping in my brain. I started looking for you down every dead-end road. They tell me you turned into flowers, they tell me you turned into honey. It's your fault I think I'm a bee. (Humberto Ak’abal, from IF TODAY WERE TOMORROW, tr. Michael Bazzett) 808 The lovely flowers embarrass me, They make me regret I am not a Bee - (Emily Dickinson, Franklin edition) 620 Much Madness is divinest Sense - To a discerning Eye - Much Sense - the starkest Madness - Tis the Majority In this, as all, prevail - Assent - and you are sane - Demur - you're straightway dangerous - And handled with a Chain - (Emily Dickinson, Franklin edition)
September 19, 2025 at 11:55 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
turkey vulture with powerlines
turkey vulture in the top of a dead tree, wings akimbo, against an azure sky and framed by a hash of powerlines above and right
September 18, 2025 at 9:47 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Since it came up in a #TellItSlant workshop today, here are a couple of NextDoor erasures from back when I could stand to open that cursed app.
• 3 days ago • light post and red excuses oh, the what not Anyway, we are in the running they are at the line and empty. This whole thing is not going to just move the city the city snuck back in. the most blinding at night. Why are we even cameras? REBEL GO In all the mess I have been pair bonded. my tan his ass the loss the I have been promised he would return I’m keeping a fair, high scar
September 17, 2025 at 10:16 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Here are the books my beloved RIS reading group (@dianalog.bsky.social @kasylongauthor.bsky.social @pounk.bsky.social @anitaholmes.bsky.social & E.F.) has read in the past year, with Dickinson always in our ears.
Emily Dickinson presides over a grid of book covers, “Read It Slant” YEAR ONE: Modern Poetry, Diane Seuss Good Monster, Diannely Antigua Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, Ross Gay Urban History Month, Scott Woods Ghost::Seeds, Sebastian Merrill Scattered Snows, to the North, Carl Phillips One with Others, CD Wright The Tradition, Jericho Brown So to Speak, Terrance Hayes
September 15, 2025 at 3:57 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
A fuzzy black caterpillar. Perhaps a (future) Many-Spotted Tiger Moth?
August 31, 2025 at 1:16 AM
katebbeall.bsky.social
And you may find yourself…living in an O’Keeffe painting
Billowy datura flower in the shade, white and exquisitely lined with soft wrinkles, edge punctuated with five softly curling antennae (some hidden), set off from the blue-green foliage behind. A single bee noses near the chartreuse and shadowed center, from which, somehow, only the protruding anthers have caught the sun.
August 23, 2025 at 3:38 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
…is this anything?
4 pictures of a pair of hands. The right hand prods the ball of the thumb on the palm of the left hand. The tip of the thumb touches the tip of a finger, as follows: thumb-index finger (rare) thumb-middle finger (medium-rare) thumb-ring finger (medium) thumb-pinky (well-done)
August 20, 2025 at 7:47 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
You can change your Moderation Settings—here’s how I set mine.
Bluesky’s Content Filters, from Settings > Moderation. Enable adult content [enabled] Adult Content: Explicit sexual images. [Warn] Sexually Suggestive: Does not include nudity. [Show] Graphic Media: Explicit or potentially disturbing media. [Warn] Non-sexual Nudity: E.g. artistic nudes. [Show]
August 14, 2025 at 10:12 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Someday maybe I’ll post a set of images where you can actually see the important part in the preview 🤷‍♀️
Tiny zine with dark brown lettering reading CHOKE and a schmear of the smashed remains of a chokecherry: deep black-red skin, tannic brown of the flesh, diffuse watery stain tinged with blackberry undertones. Below the zine, a sprig of four luminous chokecherries with three leaves.
August 8, 2025 at 11:53 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
CHOKE, a tiny Zine-in-Progress from today’s workshop with @orchidtierney.bsky.social, hosted by @sarabandebooks.bsky.social
Tiny zine with dark brown lettering reading CHOKE and a schmear of the smashed remains of a chokecherry: deep black-red skin, tannic brown of the flesh, diffuse watery stain tinged with blackberry undertones. Below the zine, a sprig of four luminous chokecherries with three leaves. Internal spread of the tiny zine (chokecherry sprig below). The chokecherry juice has bled through from the cover, forming one larger shape and some smaller ones, like a continent and off-shore island, in the middle of each page. These watery stains, tinged with blackberry undertones, are outlined in thin black ink lines. The one on the left is larger; the one on the right is smaller. Another internal spread of the tiny zine (chokecherry sprig below). Two more pages of bled-through shapes, each progressively smaller. The color is almost invisible inside the black outlines. Final internal spread of the tiny zine (chokecherry sprig below). The pages are blank.
August 8, 2025 at 11:48 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Oh hell yeah to both! 💚💚💚

(Also, & Other Stories sure knows how to pick those cover excerpts—“…the sliced end of a miniature bresaola." 😮)
Book cover image: black text on cream paper. Verdigris Michele Mari Bisected by a precise blow of the spade. the slug writhed a moment longer: then it moved no more. All its glittering viscosity was left in its wake. for the split instead revealed a dry and compact surface. whose pur-plish-brown hue made it resemble the sliced end of a miniature bresaola." Translated by Brian Robert Moore Winner of an English PEN Award
August 7, 2025 at 10:47 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
Let’s go literary/weird, yeah? 💚
A close-up cucumber vine, furred with little white hairs gleaming in the sun. A teeny tiny baby cuke curling out to the right and a fuzzy green fist of proto-leaves/flowers pushing out to the left. Everything is nearly impossible shades of green.
August 7, 2025 at 9:45 PM
katebbeall.bsky.social
TMFSWSG

The
Mullein
Flowers
Sometimes
Welcome
Small
Guests
Spike of mullein, some flowers open, one near the top currently occupied by a small, dark beetle, which faces into the mysterious, intoxicating center.
July 10, 2025 at 12:40 AM