Why subscribe?

Welcome to Long Oddities, where I (Iris Shaw) write poetry, fiction, and other things, sometimes. I also have an occasional interest in photography, and all photos here (unless otherwise stated) I’ve taken myself.

My influences are fairly wide-ranging when it comes to writing, so I hope that you enjoy reading the odd mix of verse and prose here, from the Shakespearean to the Eliot-esque to the occasional parody. As of now I post a poem or short story every Tuesday weekly. I also run an experimental section called The Journal, where I publish poems responding to something I’m reading. The current subject is Aeschylus’ Agamemnon, and these poems are posted once a week, generally.

Thanks for reading!

When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,

I all alone beweep my outcast state,

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,

And look upon myself and curse my fate,

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,

Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,

With what I most enjoy contented least;

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,

Haply I think on thee, and then my state,

(Like to the lark at break of day arising

From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;

For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings

That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

Wm. Shakespeare, Sonnet 29