...yet I'll hammer it out

Hi, Yuletide author! Thank you so much for writing for me -- I really appreciate it, and I'm so excited to see whatever you come up with.

So first of all, what sorts of general guidelines can I offer?

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Finally, here's a link to my 2013 letter (I couldn't get my shit together to write a letter last year), which has links to all my letters since 2008. Other links that might be of interest include fic I've written, fic I've recced, more fic I've recced, and the ficathon I run. Obviously you don't have to read all this stuff, but just in case. :)

In the meantime you can read my previous yuletide letter, which has links to some older ones. :)

Histories Ficathon signups are NOW OPEN. You have until June 18 to do them. Come write fic with us! IT WILL BE FUN.

THIS WEEKEND, YOU GUYS

Hold Hard, These Ancient Minutes In the Cuckoo's Month
Dylan Thomas

Hold hard, these ancient minutes in the cuckoo's month,
Under the lank, fourth folly on Glamorgan's hill,
As the green blooms ride upward, to the drive of time;
Time, in a folly's rider, like a county man
Over the vault of ridings with his hound at heel,
Drives forth my men, my children, from the hanging south.

Country, your sport is summer, and December's pools
By crane and water-tower by the seedy trees
Lie this fifth month unstaked, and the birds have flown;
Hold hard, my country children in the world of tales,
The greenwood dying as the deer fall in their tracks,
The first and steepled season, to the summer's game.

And now the horns of England, in the sound of shape,
Summon your snowy horsemen, and the four-stringed hill,
Over the sea-gut loudening, sets a rock alive;
Hurdles and guns and railings, as the boulders heave,
Crack like a spring in vice, bone breaking April,
Spill the lank folly's hunter and the hard-held hope.

Down fall four padding weathers on the scarlet lands,
Stalking my children's faces with a tail of blood,
Time, in a rider rising, from the harnessed valley;
Hold hard, my country darlings, for a hawk descends,
Golden Glamorgan straightens, to the falling birds.
Your sport is summer as the spring runs angrily.

Chi vuol conoscer, donne, il mio signore
Gaspara Stampa

Chi vuol conoscer, donne, il mio signore,
miri un signor di vago e dolce aspetto,
giovane d’ anni e vecchio d’ intelletto,
imagin della gloria e del valore:
di pelo biondo e di vivo colore,
di persona alta e spazïoso petto,
e finalmente in ogni opra perfetto,
fuor che un poco, oimè lassa! empio in amore.
E chi vuol poi conoscer me, rimiri
una donna in effetti ed in sembiante
imagin della morte e de’ martiri;
un albergo de fè salda e costante,
una che, perchè pianga, arda e sospiri,
non fa pietoso il suo crudele amante.

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On Poet-Ape
Ben Jonson

Poor Poet-Ape, that would be thought our chief,
Whose works are e'en the frippery of wit,
From brokage is become so bold a thief,
As we, the robb'd, leave rage, and pity it.
At first he made low shifts, would pick and glean,
Buy the reversion of old plays; now grown
To a little wealth, and credit in the scene,
He takes up all, makes each man's wit his own:
And, told of this, he slights it. Tut, such crimes
The sluggish gaping auditor devours;
He marks not whose 'twas first: and after-times
May judge it to be his, as well as ours.
Fool! as if half eyes will not know a fleece
From locks of wool, or shreds from the whole piece?

Rosalind's Madrigal
Thomas Lodge


Love in my bosom like a bee
Doth suck his sweet;
Now with his wings he plays with me,
Now with his feet.
Within mine eyes he makes his nest,
His bed amidst my tender breast;
My kisses are his daily feast,
And yet he robs me of my rest.
Ah, wanton, will ye?

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From the Dark Tower
Countee Cullen

We shall not always plant while others reap
The golden increment of bursting fruit,
Not always countenance, abject and mute,
That lesser men should hold their brothers cheap;
Not everlastingly while others sleep
Shall we beguile their limbs with mellow flute,
Not always bend to some more subtle brute;
We were not made eternally to weep.

The night whose sable breast relieves the stark,
White stars is no less lovely being dark,
And there are buds that cannot bloom at all
In light, but crumple, piteous, and fall;
So in the dark we hide the heart that bleeds,
And wait, and tend our agonizing seeds.

Sonnet: To the Poppy
Anna Seward

While summer roses all their glory yield
To crown the votary of love and joy,
Misfortune’s victim hails, with many a sigh,
Thee, scarlet Poppy of the pathless field,
Gaudy, yet wild and lone; no leaf to shield
Thy flaccid vest that, as the gale blows high,
Flaps, and alternate folds around thy head.
So stands in the long grass a love-crazed maid,
Smiling aghast; while stream to every wind
Her garish ribbons, smeared with dust and rain;
But brain-sick visions cheat her tortured mind,
And bring false peace. Thus, lulling grief and pain,
Kind dreams oblivious from thy juice proceed,
Thou flimsy, showy, melancholy weed.