Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Poet, former Florist & landscaper/horticulturist, Associate Professor of English at a CC in Indy, Founder & EIC of The Indianapolis Review.

Author of Water Castle
https://nataliesolmer.com/

Posts Replies Media Videos

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Very excited to be reading poems at Wabash College on Wednesday at noon with Katy Didden and Donald Platt! Many thanks to Derek Mong @derekmong.bsky.social for organizing the Hoosier Poetry Reading Series!

November 14, 2025 at 7:08 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Saw everyone posting, and it's real!! This is my first time seeing the Northern Lights! And I live in Indy, surrounded by light pollution. Very cool! 💓 #nofilter #northernlights

November 12, 2025 at 3:10 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Just wanted to say I've been loving serving as the poetry faculty member for the Religion, Spirituality, and the Arts program with Herron School of Art! We've been having our classes @newfieldstoday , and i took a pic of Kori Newkirk's "Black Dandelion" sculpture the other night 🖤🌕🌼

November 10, 2025 at 11:01 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

My native honeysuckle vine bloomed for the first time-in October! ❤️

October 31, 2025 at 12:19 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

"Likkle but Tallawah" that JA phrase has been in my head all week. 🇯🇲

October 30, 2025 at 10:29 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Literally cannot sleep...just sitting up, praying for our 🇯🇲 family. Pics from our visit this summer.

October 28, 2025 at 6:34 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Pierogi Tour Poetry reading was a success! 😃🇵🇱❤️

October 22, 2025 at 7:22 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

I'll post more pics later, but our pierogi tour poetry reading was a resounding success!!! Thanks to Mindy Dunn, @butlermfa @ania_spyra @rockwellsays and Karen Kovacik! Not one pieorgi was left uneaten! 🤣❤️🇵🇱

October 20, 2025 at 2:31 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Thanks to @anomalouspress for publishing 4 new poems of mine, all "girl on the spectrum manifestos" i wrote in response to their special call for 'autistic protest poetry' after RFK's ridiculous comments re: autistic people. There is so much cool stuff in this issue! 💜
anmly.org/ap41/natalie...

Girl On the Spectrum Manifesto, no. 1

We hide in plain sight they say, as if something sinister
à la RFK Jr. to Trump, Asperger to Hitler. So many
girls & women unnamed. Boys & men four times
more likely to get a diagnosis. But this is not a disease,
not something only boys who love trains & walk on their toes
can have, though I, a girl/woman, did walk on my toes.
When I read of that symptom in a book, I gasped;

I was just figuring it out & over the age of 40,

remembering my parents took me to the doctor
for toe-walking beyond when a toddler would stop

& though none of my children toe-walked,

each have their uniqueness & one of my sons

as he struggled young, ADHD, I was questioning, reading

like so many mothers, a light started to glow,

go off in my brain & when one magnificent female student

of mine, student who wore a lanyard brightly stating

I am autistic & was her whole self in my classroom

through class, when she wore sunglasses

in the awful florescent light, when she brought me

a houseplant she propagated when we found

we shared a special interest, when she shared

her other interest was keeping roly-polies as pets

in a box in her window well, I was reminded of myself

as a child & the toads in my window well I kept as pets

& she wrote the best poems out of everyone in the class

& when she sat underneath her desk during lecture

without fanfare or apparent shame & which I didn’t think odd,

instead, I felt . . . envy, seeing my secret behavior on display.

Not only as a child, but as an adult, in my apartment

I would sit underneath my desk after coming home

would sit underneath my desk after coming home

from some social thing, when feeling overwhelmed,

I felt the little cave the desk made could hold the world,

keep it from crushing me, the glass shell around me,

& in that remembering, the message on her lanyard

glowed bright & with sunflowers surrounding the words,

I am autistic. That word autistic familiar, thrown around

about my eccentric, engineer father throughout my childhood

when my mother heard about Aspergers, but I thought

because I didn’t like math, didn’t build computers,

it couldn’t be me. Never mind how I didn’t, couldn’t

talk in school until fourth grade, I was labeled gifted

& shy. Never mind my anxiety & depression &

obsessions, how even now, after I participate

in some poetry event, I can’t sleep, dissect it all night

friends say I’d never know. Here I am, writing poems.

Eugenicists take note, my autistic student was the most

talented student in the room & though the label is not

magic, it’s a way of living in this brain,

fuck a cure for who we are,

after forty years of What Is Wrong With Me?,

this was my answer, bright sunflower.

October 15, 2025 at 11:04 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Thanks to ANMLY for publishing 4 new poems of mine, all "girl on the spectrum manifestos" i wrote for their 'autistic protest poetry' call after RFK's comments. There is so much cool stuff in this issue! 💜
anmly.org/ap41/natalie... @anmlymag.bsky.social

October 15, 2025 at 6:19 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Loved this reading at Proof Midwest Lit festival with Rosalie Moffett Kristine Esser Slentz and Teresa Dzieglewicz ! Mitchell L.H. Douglas and Chantel Massey have done an amazing job once again, along with everyone at Indiana Humanities ! @indianahumanities.bsky.social

October 12, 2025 at 3:20 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Had a wonderful experience on the panel about the responsibility of editors regarding censorship at Proof Midwest lit fest with Rosalie Moffett and Mark Neeley!

October 12, 2025 at 3:11 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Excited for Indiana Humanities Proof literary festival! So many things I want to check out & and tomorrow I will be on a panel about censorship and editing with Rosalie Moffett, Mark Neeley, and Santiago Valencia! @indianahumanities.bsky.social

October 10, 2025 at 12:36 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

A surprise waterlily in October 🍁🍂

October 8, 2025 at 9:35 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Really proud of this issue! Check it out--
theindianapolisreview.com

October 7, 2025 at 9:57 PM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Nazifa Islam @nafoopal in The Indianapolis Review Summer Issue theindianapolisreview.com/featured-art...

October 6, 2025 at 2:28 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

@emmdubb16.bsky.social
Maya Williams @emmdubb16 in The Indianapolis Review Summer Issue theindianapolisreview.com/three-times-...

October 6, 2025 at 2:18 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Kevin A. Risner in The Indianapolis Review Summer Issue theindianapolisreview.com/a-new-year-g...

October 6, 2025 at 2:06 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Lee Johnson in The Indianapolis Review Summer Issue theindianapolisreview.com/featured-art...

October 6, 2025 at 1:26 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Matthew Zhao in The Indianapolis Review Summer Issue theindianapolisreview.com/mother-carri...

October 6, 2025 at 1:17 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

Bill Wolak in The Indianapolis Review Summer Issue theindianapolisreview.com/featured-art...

October 5, 2025 at 3:04 AM

Natalie Solmer

@nataliesolmer.bsky.social

These visual poems in The Indianapolis Review Summer Issue by Novella Wu are amazing. Inspired by @newyorktimesgames check out the video here- theindianapolisreview.com/sounds-of-th...