#drought is a leela song

[magicofthepen]

tagged by @sircarolyn (thank you <3) to post four songs I've had on repeat lately! 

I should use this as an opportunity to go on about my various Gallifrey interests....alas my Unity family playlist is Shiny and New, so this is gonna be heavily skewed towards them. (in other words......@sircarolyn, no we’re still on our Unity bullshit <3)

1. North by Sleeping at Last

This is The Song for my Veega fic. It’s the warmth and joy in the small moments of life (We'll tell our stories on these walls / Every year, measure how tall), it’s rebuilding your life again and again (With each year, our color fades, slowly, our paint chips away / But we will find the strength and the nerve it takes to repaint and repaint and repaint every day) and continuing to believe in kindness and in love (Let the years we're here be kind / Let our hearts, like doors, open wide), it’s all of my feelings about the power of daring to try to find happiness in the middle of a war (Though the storms will push and pull / We will call this place our home). I am in extreme danger of quoting the entire song, but basically this is the emotional heart of the Unity fic I’m starting to work on. 

(And this song is also where Call It Home’s title came from! So it’s also a song for Romana/Leela/Narvin during that relatively peaceful time after Enemy Lines but before the Time War hits, and it definitely captures the vibes of that fic too.) 

2. Walk You Home by Karmina 

This is a Leela/Veega song!! (Stay here, it's ok to cry / Let me, help you make it right) Two people who are traumatized and grieving in their own ways and leaning on each other to get through the days and slowly building something.....I love them <33 And I just really like this song in general, it’s about the importance of letting ourselves depend on other people and be supported (Even the brave may depend on someone / The moon only shines with the help of the sun / And it's not as safe when your walking alone / I'll walk you home). 

3. The Last Snowfall by Vienna Teng

This is a sad Leela/Veega song......(If this were the last slow curling of your fingers in my palm / If this were the last I felt you breathing, how would I carry on?) It’s about the fear and possibility of loss, and so it hurts a lot knowing that Leela does lose Veega. The last verse of this song is about how this isn’t actually the end (This is not the last snowfall, not our last embrace / But if I were that kind of grateful, what would I try to say?), but looking at it in a Leela/Veega context, it gives me a lot of painful feelings about how Veega never actually tells Leela that she’s dying. She keeps telling Leela that everything’s fine (This is not the last snowfall) until it isn’t. And But if I were that kind of grateful, what would I try to say? kills me because Leela never got that moment to say goodbye, but also it does remind me of their last conversation (“You’ve been so good to us over the years.” / “And you have been good to me.”)

4. Forest Fires by Lauren Aquilina

And a new addition to my Romana/Leela playlist! This one really hits my beginning of series 3 painful feelings, when Leela’s throwing herself into the war to cope with her grief (And whilst I watch in silence, you're starting forest fires, you start them just to feel the heat) and Romana’s convinced Leela hates her (You're running with the tigers, you're running just to run from me. / And I don't blame you / Who would wanna be around me?), and they’re both caught in such self-destructive spirals and everything is so so emotionally fraught. :(

tagging: @whoteacheswho, @sparklingdocta, @loombarrow, @fortes-fortuna-iogurtum, @escapegrin, @custardhoneybee (if you want to do this - feel free to ignore if you don’t!)

#i had to make an effort not to just list all vienna teng songs because i've been listening to her stuff A Lot lately #so i'm uhhh just going to sneak some in the tags: #momentum is a leela/veega song #lullaby for a stormy night is a leela & rayo and veega & rayo song #stray italian greyhound is a narvin/romana song #gravity i used to title a narvin/romana fic but it’s more romana/leela #drought is a leela song #and those are just the vienna teng songs i've recently added to playlists #yes every song is a gallifrey song these days :) #tag games #ramblings #gallifrey audios #leela x veega #unity family #romana x leela

[jshoulson]

Today’s Poem

Not one more refugee death --Emmy Peréz

A river killed a man I loved, And I love that river still

—María Meléndez

1. Thousands of fish killed after Pemex spill in el Río Salado and everyone runs out to buy more bottled water. Here, our river kills more crossers than the sun, than the singular

heat of Arizona, than the ranchlands near the Falfurrias checkpoint. It's hard to imagine an endangered river with that much water, especially in summer and with the Falcon Reservoir

in drought, though it only takes inches to drown. Sometimes, further west, there's too little river to paddle in Boquillas Canyon where there are no steel-column walls

except the limestone canyon's drop and where a puma might push-wade across, or in El Paso, where double-fenced muros sparkle and blind with bullfight ring lights, the ring the concrete river mold, and above

a Juárez mountain urges La Biblia es La Verdad—Leela.

2. Today at the vigil, the native singer said we are all connected by water, la sangre de vida.

Today, our vigil signs proclaimed McAllen is not Murrieta. #iamborderless. Derechos Inmigrantes=Derechos Humanos. Bienvenidos niños. We stand with refugee children. We are all human. Bienvenidos a los Estados Unidos.

And the songs we sang the copal that burned and the rose petals spread en los cuatro puntos were for the children and women and men. Songs

for the Guatemalan boy with an Elvis belt buckle and Angry Birds jeans with zippers on back pockets who was found shirtless in La Joya, one mile from the river. The worn jeans

that helped identify his body in the news more times than a photo of him while alive. (I never knew why the birds are angry. My mother said someone stole their eggs.)

The Tejas sun took a boy I do not know, a young man who wanted to reach Chicago, his brother's number etched in his belt, his mother's pleas not to leave in white rosary beads

he carried. The sun in Tejas stopped a boy the river held. Detention centers filled, churches offer showers and fresh clothes. Water and a covered porch may have waited at a stranger's house

or in a patrol truck had his body not collapsed. Half of our bodies are made of water, and we can't sponge rivers through skin and release them again like rain clouds. Today

at the vigil the native singer sang we are all connected by water, la sangre de vida.

#Today's Poem #Emmy Peréz

[jshoulson]

Today’s Poem

Not one more refugee death --Emmy Pérez

A river killed a man I loved, And I love that river still

—María Meléndez 1. Thousands of fish killed after Pemex spill in el Río Salado and everyone runs out to buy more bottled water. Here, our river kills more crossers than the sun, than the singular

heat of Arizona, than the ranchlands near the Falfurrias checkpoint. It's hard to imagine an endangered river with that much water, especially in summer and with the Falcon Reservoir

in drought, though it only takes inches to drown. Sometimes, further west, there's too little river to paddle in Boquillas Canyon where there are no steel-column walls

except the limestone canyon's drop and where a puma might push-wade across, or in El Paso, where double-fenced muros sparkle and blind with bullfight ring lights, the ring the concrete river mold, and above

a Juárez mountain urges La Biblia es La Verdad—Leela.

2. Today at the vigil, the native singer said we are all connected by water, la sangre de vida.

Today, our vigil signs proclaimed McAllen is not Murrieta. #iamborderless. Derechos Inmigrantes=Derechos Humanos. Bienvenidos niños. We stand with refugee children. We are all human. Bienvenidos a los Estados Unidos.

And the songs we sang the copal that burned and the rose petals spread en los cuatro puntos were for the children and women and men. Songs

for the Guatemalan boy with an Elvis belt buckle and Angry Birds jeans with zippers on back pockets who was found shirtless in La Joya, one mile from the river. The worn jeans

that helped identify his body in the news more times than a photo of him while alive. (I never knew why the birds are angry. My mother said someone stole their eggs.)

The Tejas sun took a boy I do not know, a young man who wanted to reach Chicago, his brother's number etched in his belt, his mother's pleas not to leave in white rosary beads

he carried. The sun in Tejas stopped a boy the river held. Detention centers filled, churches offer showers and fresh clothes. Water and a covered porch may have waited at a stranger's house

or in a patrol truck had his body not collapsed. Half of our bodies are made of water, and we can't sponge rivers through skin and release them again like rain clouds. Today

at the vigil the native singer sang we are all connected by water, la sangre de vida.

#Today's Poem #Emmy Pérez