Alysse Aallyn is the author of four well-received thrillers, Find Courtney, Depraved Heart, Woman Into Wolf and I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead, one historical novel (Devlyn) and a book of short stories (Awake Till the End.) Her work has been translated into German and Italian. She has three published books of poetry – The Sacred Quiver, The Hot Skin, Haunted Wedding and The Five Wounds and edited another (The Feathered Violin.) She trained in theatre at Circle in the Square Theatre School and Martha Graham School of Dance. She appeared in the part of Isabella in Jean Giraudoux’s The Enchanted at the New Yorker Theatre. She has held writing fellowships at Brooklyn College and LaSalle University. Her novel Depraved Heart won a 2011 CT Press Club fiction award and her play Queen of Swords was a semi-finalist in the 2014 National Arts Council First Play award. She has been invited to read her original work at The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC and has taught creative writing at Catonsville Community College. Woman Into Wolf was a semi-finalist for The National Playwrights Conference (2016) and her play Our Father’s Restaurant was performed on Pacifica Radio. She has also appeared as a crime commentator on ID – TV’s Blood Relatives. Her play, Let’s Speak Vietnamese was published in Dramatika Magazine. She directed The Maids and played the Mother in Jules Feiffer’s Little Murders for Theatre Upstairs. Other plays she’s written are The Honey & the Pang about Emily Dickinson’s posthumous career, Cuck’d – a modern Othello, and Caving, in which the theatre is transformed into a cave for a spelunking dare. Rough Sleep, (based on her novel I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead) was produced by Manhattan Repertory Theatre (W. 45th St) in 2019. Her latest play, The Dalingridge Horror, (short version Leonard & Virginia) explores the partnership between Leonard & Virginia Woolf in their own words and was a finalist for the Tennessee Williams 2021 award. Her newest poetry collection, Haunted Wedding appeared in 2022 from Thriller Library.
Her current work is The WarriorOracle – Becoming a Warrior on the path to enlightenment.
If This Card Chooses You – How many people are you? Twinning is Entwining. Sometimes we dream disturbingly about things we don’t want and people we aren’t. Feminists dream of rape, vegetarians dream of meat, pacifists dream of fighting. It’s confusing. What gives?
Language Isn’t Subtle Enough to Explain You – Your personality manifests all feelings, all thoughts, all ideas, rippling through you in a vast subconscious river. Your unconscious connects with the “collective unconscious” of other peoples – dead, alive, even fictional. Why isn’t “hate-love” a word? You experience that regularly. How about “fear-attraction”? Common! What I’m suggesting is that we need to accept the fact that a “personality” is a dynamism, not a label.
Warrior Challenge – Facing this might seem the toughest part, but it isn’t for artists, who routinely “play” along their edge, peeking over it and imagining life on the other side. Art is the best way to express this, an enormous relief since it’s non-committal. Of course, you’ll have to face the surprise of your relatives when your work becomes public: “Where did THAT come from?” But if truth be told, we’ve always been surprised to be related to those people.
Warrior Danger – Society seeks to label, limit and stigmatize. Everyone is afraid of becoming our fear but Warriors need to explore our fear. A simple safe word can’t work when people – bankers, politicians, therapists, employers – are so fundamentally untrustworthy. That is why our identification of ourselves as Brave Warriors is so vital. The vastness of our potential cannot be controlled by language. We will never be butterflies pinned down in a museum box for the instruction/curiosity of others.
Warrior Opportunity – Appreciate your Self. Don’t slam the door on your potentialities too soon. Sometimes the worst labeler, the most determined jailor, is Us. We are deeply afraid of wandering in the forest and losing the way to get home safe. But Warriors carry Home within them. As Nelson Mandela used to quote from his prison cell, if we are the captains of our souls we can be the masters of our fates. (Henley.) We can learn to tolerate a little ambiguity/uncertainty/ambivalence.
Warriors Tolerate Uncertainty – Being a warrior is all about balance. The experience of balance-seeking is indescribable linguistically – it must be felt experientially. Warriors learn to live in a world beyond language where we can savor uncertainty and foretaste eternity.
Warriors Relish Paradox – Two contraries not only exist together but empower each other – that creative tension is the lifeblood of emotion, imagination and personality.
Warriors Coast on the Knife-Edge of Ambivalence – The desired is undesirable, the only possibility is impossible and the act of wanting forbids getting. Warriors become comfortable with the pleasures of this dance: “My future dissolves in beads of sweat, my present is my mirror, my past’s a shape-shifting whirligig.” (Aallyn)
Leaders Must Surrender – Physics is magic and dreams embody history. This quantum world of “spooky entanglements” is one in which we warriors become expert. We accept not only that the cave we fear holds the treasure we desire, but that we are both cave and treasure, indeed, fear itself.
Models & Mentors – “It seems we are capable of immense love and loyalty and as capable of deceit and atrocity. It is this shocking ambivalence that makes us unique.” – John Scott
“Ambivalence is a wonderful tune to dance to. It has a rhythm all its own.” – Erica Jong
“The Simpsons is about alienation and the ambivalence of living with a family who you love but drives you crazy” – Matt Groening
“Poetry is the home of ambiguity, ambivalence and uncertainty.” – Billy Collins
#Haiku: Yin/yang
Inclined to spring forward Fade back; yin; Urge to return? Float forward; Yang.
IF THIS CARD CHOOSES YOU – Something’s bothering you. Do you lie awake at night recalling bad moments from the past? The Regret Warrior Oracle card says you need tackle the problem of “change” NOW. What moods flood in when you close your eyes? What would you change NOW? How do you WANT to change?
Why are people so afraid of looking inside their psyches? Because of Regret, that’s why. The things we’ve already done or that we already are that can never be changed. Sorrow floods in – now we feel helpless, we hate ourselves and we can’t fix anything. We fear we are in for a bad, cold, frigid winter of discontent.
LIGHTEN YOUR LOAD – No one can do this but you. You are serving as prosecutor against your own life and guess what? – that’s not fair. Fundamental Attribution Error means people blaming individuals for actions that were the result of mass decisions or life circumstances over which they had no actual control. Look into it, if you want to. (Sometimes we need to.) Or you can just forgive yourself and move on. After all, we’ve got the future to think of. Warriors won’t be stymied.
WARRIOR CHALLENGE – First, forgive yourself. You were held hostage by fortune (we all were) and inevitably you went full-on Stockholm Syndrome and identified with your attackers and tried to please them. (We all did. It’s called Society.) Now you’re madder at yourself than you are at them. Forgive yourself.
WARRIOR DANGER – The moment you drop that burden, you’re in another part of the forest. Surprise! This wasn’t the plan but here you are. The Danger is – you’ll give up. Don’t. NEVER GIVING UP IS THE WARRIOR’S SUPERPOWER. We CREATE paths where none existed. You can easily see from every fairy tale and hero’s journey you’ve ever studied that now we’re getting to the Good Part. By testing your muscle you get to grow your muscle. If your muscle is never tested, it withers. So get ready.
WARRIOR OPPORTUNITY – We don’t know everything. Even Jesus demonstrated surprise about the way things turned out. Be gentle as a dove, he advised, but wily as a serpent. Serpents can get out of anything. (Ask a herpetologist.) And so can you. It’s just a bigger world than we knew – both inner and outer – so get mapping. I guarantee you – IT GETS BETTER.
YOUR Superpower: Our brains are constructed in a way that allows us to move backward and forward through time, watching and judging ourselves from the outside, always considering multiple possibilities, outcomes and problems. We have a tendency to regard this power as a burden and envy those whose lack of questioning seems to make them more carefree. But it is this exact superpower that designates us as Warriors.
Even When We Enjoy We Regret: There’s always something we could have done differently. And that unknown outcome is bound to seem preferable to the reality in which we find ourselves. Don’t waste time on regret. You drew the “Regret” card to remind you that time – even pleasurable time – is always limited. Restrict the amount of time you spend on regret! Congratulate yourself on your ability to play a multi-level game, forward and backward through time, peopled by a panoply of characters. Open up your Training Journal and take a God’s eye view of your world. See anything different? Fresh? Exciting? New?
There’s Lots to Enjoy About Autumn – It’s a beginning, not an ending! The world is freshening up to divest those tired leaves and grow some sharper weather! Always consider the exercise possibilities. Maybe you can stay out longer! There’s a lot of fellow Warriors in the Polar Bear Club!
Models & Mentors – “I’d rather regret the things I’ve done than the things I haven’t done.” – Lucille Ball
“There are no regrets in life, only lessons.” – Jennifer Aniston
“We have only one life, and the second life begins the moment we realize that fact” – Confucius
“I was designed by my Creator to not only feel pain and love but to become whole inside it. I am a Warrior” – Glennon Doyle
“Autumn, the year’s last, loveliest smile” – William Cullen Bryant
#Haiku: Regret
Coulda Woulda Shoulda Didn’t. Now you Wish Things Different. Clean slate. Write.
What It Means If This Card Chooses You – You are gathering force for a great work. Do your dreams pulse with some energy gathering within you? You are readying yourself for some great task.
YOU ARE A POWER – You are struggling to find your force. You feel the power and strength of as yet undefined wishes and the longing to create your place in the world. No guide exists to this wilderness, you will have to map this forest yourself. Be brave.
YOUR CHALLENGE – There are plenty of traps ahead. Do not become discouraged. Accept that the flow of energy pulses with your every heart beat, with your sleep/rest cycle, with the obligations you willingly seek to smooth your path.
YOUR DANGERS – Some of these obligations become too heavy, others seek to deter you from your set course. Still others offer false maps that seem to promise the ease of “I don’t have to do this alone.” We are all alone inside our heads and you – and only you – must be satisfied with the map you create. If you aren’t there’s no fellowship or wealth that can compensate you for that loss.
YOUR OPPORTUNITIES – We revel in and with our fellow travelers. There could be a soulmate among them – for a time or for a life. Accept the wisdom of others, the wisdom of the path, consult other maps in designing your own. Be prepared to alter your map – joyously – with each new and fresh discovery. There will be many. Salut!
HOW I BECAME A WARRIOR: I had three sisters so feel I was really raised by them, rather than by my parents. Each offered a modality for Being that was intriguing to me, the quiet, sensitive, observant one. My eldest sister was very cooperative with my rather demanding parents until it came to her love life, then she slammed the door on them. She was a Love Warrior. My second sister pretended to fulfill parental demands but she was actually full of subversive ideas. She was a Covert Warrior. My little sister just wanted everyone to get along and have a good time. She was a Peace Warrior. And me? I needed lots of alone time to study other people, read, think and design various futures. I was a Thought Warrior. I discovered people have much stronger mental powers than they give themselves credit for, and these powers can be developed.
Planning: My diary has always been my staging area for figuring out what I want to do next, assessing reactions and sketching out scenarios. It helped me learn detachment – I am not locked into any one idea, and because I considered or experimented with something it does not define me. Your key in Strategy Sessions is to cultivate a sense of freedom.
Warrior Danger: People will spend their time trying to get a handle on you so that they can control you, and they are not above using your own training journal to shame you. Don’t let it happen. “These are exercises,” you must tell them, “To develop my flexibility as a warrior I must play with multiple personae. The Life Force requires it.”
Becoming a Warrior: Exercise is important to Warriors, especially thought warriors and introvert warriors. Becoming just a Brain in a slack body is imprisonment. Try out every different sport that is offered to you. The one that worked best for me was dance.
How did the people you admire manifest the Life Force? Jesus spent an epic 40 day & nights in the desert. Margaret Mead lived in Samoa studying the Samoans. Carl Sagan describes his “defining moment” as visiting the World’s Fair at four years old. It exploded and expanded his mind. Who are your models? Research them and study their transitions and experiments.
Magic & Mystery: A you accept yourself and accept your changes, you are confronting the dynamic of change, which is the manifestation of energy in existence. We are all alive and moving. This is a dance and you are the choreographer and star. Erik Erikson said “A good life is like a weaving. Energy is created in the tension. The pull and tug, the struggle, is everything.”
Commit to tiring yourself out during the day with thought, exercise and interrelations so that you can enjoy healthy sleep at night.
Models & Mentors – ‘Every thought has an energy. Thoughts send out a magnetic frequency” – Rhonda Byrne
“Energy is the power that drives every human being. It is not lost by exertion but maintained by it – for it is a faculty of the psyche” – Germaine Greer
“If you want to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration” – Nikola Tesla “The more positive energy you throw into the universe, the more positive energy you get back” – Nitin Namdeo
#Haiku: Catalytic Action
Partake: Energy blooms; Whirlpools Dance; I am Limitless So are you
Being a warrior means you never give up, you modify goals and you redesign maps.
My explorations into True Crime had taught me what people REALLY do. Clearly, there’s no necessity to make up plots; in my next novel the challenge would be explaining what humans get up to and why.
After the weirdly destructive father/daughter vibe of my last full-time job I became interested in three real stories – a kidnapped toddler where the FBI became convinced the parents were lying, a father in Florida pulling out all the stops searching for his missing teen (later found to have been murdered by a serial killer) and a father pimping out his own daughter (later revealed to be a kidnap victim.)
I swirled all these into the psychological thriller Find Courtney, where a college student helps a distraught father search for her missing roommate, only to discover that he is definitely NOT what he seems. I whipped the paintings of Edvard Munch, tales of long-dead fan dancers and arson scams into a fine froth of first-person storytelling.
I got an offer from the first publisher I submitted it to, an exciting Bridgehampton start-up promising the personal touch. It was published to wonderful reviews, but there were unseen cliffs ahead! Luckily warriors are good at managing hard landings and surprise outcomes.
#Haiku: Find Courtney
In the Dead Killer’s house; Who needs A sexy pirate Playing Daddy?
What It Means If You Choose This Card – Your ego has work to do. Jung tells us that in your dream, you are everyone. You chose the Ego card to start your day. Or did it choose you?
YOU ARE A SEEKER – You are self-defining. You are on a quest. You wish to explore your possible incarnations.
WARRIOR DANGERS– The danger of solipsism is that in turning our eyes inward we miss important signals coming from other people and the world around us. Yet you must “retreat inward” it’s a vital path to self-knowledge and growth.
WARRIOR CHALLENGE -set a Spirituality Schedule to reflect your needs and interests. Appoint time to be absolutely alone, for meditation and reflection. If you cannot find a room to yourself, a closet will do. You can sit in the meditation position or assume any position that allows you to be comfortable enough to become physically forgetful. Concentrate first on building a life that allows both inner and outer growth. Surround yourself with people who respect this decision.
WARRIOR OPPORTUNITY – This is a journey. Accept it. Begin a journal with 1. “I” and write down your meditation thoughts and desires. This can be a poem, a fantasy, a checklist – whatever pattern occurs to you as supportive of your desires. Make a list of goals. Push shame away. This is about YOU. Of course as you evolve, your goals will evolve, and your journal will reflect that. When you have completed your Time Alone – ten minutes to an hour – whatever works for you – pat yourself on the back. What an achievement! You are started on a path of making changing Nightmares into Dreams and making dreams come true.
How I Became a Warrior: Am I me or is my diary me? I’ve been keeping a diary since I was seven years old. My first problem was who I was writing to – that took seven years to solve. (Answer: Me.) My second problem was who I was. I haven’t solved that one yet but since I became a warrior I feel I’m within sighting distance of the answer.
A warrior repels takeover because
A warrior knows what she has to defend
A warrior knows when to let down her guard
A warrior learns from mistakes and hones her art
Planning: Warriors lead a designed life. A diary (also called a Training Journal)offers the ideal format in which to plan. Attempt to quantify the difficulties that you feel and assess possible reactions. Just because a situation is tough does not mean it shouldn’t be explored – on the contrary
Warriors aren’t afraid of difficulty:
Warriors look for opportunities for resistance training
The First Resistance – Often savage, is from yourself. Slowly we realize we have hijackers inside our brains wrestling for control. You can recognize these by their negative content. They clearly wish to subdue us into clones which is NOT HEALTHY.
Becoming a Warrior – It is this resistance that first marks our warrior status. Congratulate yourself. You are on the road.
Training Journal – Carefully assess your desires versus the demands on you. List expected results if you gave in to either. Develop a concept of health. Is ”freedom” staying up all night, consuming whatever substance makes you “feel better”? Clearly not. Assess the negative voice; “You’re weak”, for example. Being “in flight” from the negative voice is actually giving it mastery, you must stand up to it. Learn to answer back – “I’m in training. I did better today than yesterday.” Keep track of your achievements. Even really small ones: “I meditated for 10 minutes” are significant.
Models & Mentors: Always survey possible models. Who do you admire? Is it
Bruce Lee: “The difference between a warrior and an average man is laser focus.”
Is it Carl Jung: “I am not what happened to me I am what I choose to become.” Develop your own models.
Accept mystery: Life isn’t “win or lose.” It can’t be quantified because we are magical souls with magic coursing through us. Sometimes it’s impossible to figure out and must simply be absorbed, not rationalized. Learn to enjoy art and accept the relief it offers. Reflect back as much magic & mystery as you can muster. Your tastes will develop according to your growth – that’s a good thing. Treat yourself like a loving sensei who wants the best for you.
Sharing poetry is the most painful vulnerability. That was when I realized for the first time that pursuing life of art requires the warrior sensibility. You have to keep going, no matter what other people say and what they recommend. Some advice is good and some isn’t. We all need to develop our warrior instincts and our warrior sensibilities.
Poetry is a language it takes a lifetime to learn to speak. Luckily, other people speak it! Back when I was a new mother for the first time, I advertised for poets and assembled a book of over 50 poems, representing over 40 poets from 26 states, writing about the experience of being female, and called it The Feathered Violin. We printed 450 copies and shared it widely, all around the country.
In terms of sheer daring, this may have been one of the most daring things I’ve ever done!
When I gave my stepmother a short story to read, she recommended I join a writer’s group. I laughed and said I’d belonged to COUNTLESS writer’s groups! Literally, God knows how many.
She was surprised, I guess that my bumps hadn’t been smoothed out.
It takes courage to share your passions. I saw a lot of talent in writer’s groups. They definitely showed me techniques of riveting attention grabs I hadn’t yet thought of. But every writer comes up against the problem of; how much are you going to let them change you. Usually, if you follow someone’s direction down an uncertain path, you need to be able to trust that person. And I could never quite get there.
I remember when my first serious novel was accepted for publication – “serious” as opposed to my gothic – I was so excited, and immediately shared that info with two of my writer’s groups, thinking they might want me to speak about the effort and the experience. But they showed no interest whatsoever. I couldn’t even get my local newspaper interested!
I contacted my old writing teacher and offered him a copy but he was uninterested, too. He’d moved on.
This was a shock. I couldn’t have pissed off ALL these people – in one of those groups I had been a completely accepting student. I began to think it might be like contacting a home-buying seminar and telling them you’ve bought a house. All they’ll say is, “Good for you.”
Writer’s groups are about relationships – something I suspect I’ve never been good at.
My courage was diminished: somewhat. Luckily the Warrior Ethos tells you that’s exactly the time to make a plan to keep going. Because Being Warrior isn’t about Going Along to Get Along. It’s about finding out what the truth really is, every time. Truth isn’t a fact, it’s a modality Warriors live in. Warrior passion never diminishes. It grows.
#Haiku: Wake Up I’m All Alone
#Haiku: Wake Up I’m All Alone
Spooks need Dupes: Dead need Goodbyes: Sustain Feedback loop: Frustrate Rejection.
After the birth of my first child I bought a printing press – an adorable little toy that printed a 3×5 inch page and elegant “Egyptian” type. I wanted to print my own book of poems – The Hot Skin – and I didn’t want to ”delegate” anything. I also bought a binding machine and designed the covers – plain black and white –by myself. The pleasure of not having to rely on other people was immensely freeing.
I also bought a sorter in which to place the ordered printed pages, taped to it the slogan “Work Is Love Made Visible” (St. Catherine) and moved this whole conglomeration, plus the baby’s playpen, to the small cottage at StormFall Farm for a poetic summer in the Berkshires.
My husband planned to commute back and forth from Philadelphia.
I was determined to have the experience Virginia Woolf so movingly describes in her diaries – sorting type as a way to self-soothe.
At the time I was staying in the cottage, my husband’s grandmother was up at the big house where I often went for drinks and dinner with her. This grandmother had always been wealthy but was a big believer in “noblesse oblige” and common sense. She was very shocked that I would sometimes alter one of my poems to suit my type requirements and told me, sadly, this meant I was not a real poet. I laughed out loud. This woman would not recognize Art if it bit her.
When my husband arrived he was angry and aggrieved that I had dedicated the book to him, thanking him for helping with the baby. Didn’t I understand what an insult that was? What would people think? Who would want to invest their money with a baby-minder?
I was gobsmacked. His violent hysteria was even more frightening than his arguments. My first husband was a cool, smooth seducer, accustomed to lying to get his way. My second husband was very different, but I was beginning to see that the rage and the pathos were deeper than I’d realized. But with poetry you can understand – and express – anything.
IN THE BUTTERFLY PAVILION
This evening you said you wished I was more ordinary. I bowed my head. I did not speak. Outside the animals leaned together, Breathing lightly; waiting For my answer. Cats-tongue ferns Swelled up like swords, pushed out a stink Occluding fields of vision while The rabbit-bloodied lawn curled away. Phlox flamed Sows littered in the cyclamen Dwarf stars broke free as Frazzled molten ore raced across a sky Darkening to night. Summoning my power My hands stay folded in my sleeves. Nighttime is my kingdom.
During pursuit of my never achieved degree in Rehab Counseling (at Springfield College) I worked three years at Easter Seal. There were good things about it but it was not a happy experience. I taught Career Exploration – that was the fun part, trying to open the eyes of frightened people diagnosed as “disabled” to the possibilities out there. I knew very little about computers – just coming into vogue – and Easter Seals refused to get me training – but I passed on what little I could figure out. We worked on resumes, interviews, goal setting, and seeing yourself through the employers’ eyes.
While I worked there Easter Seals built a glamorous new building and moved all “managers” out. It was carefully explained to us that anyone actually providing services to clients was unimportant, replaceable, and would be paid as little as possible – being a manager, on the other hand, was a high-status, remunerative, important occupation.
I saw I needed a new job, pronto and used my new skills to get hired at a non-profit start-up of ex-addicts hoping to influence legislation. As the sole “office help” I enjoyed creating business practices from the ground up. I kept track of members and planned member events. Unfortunately, my boss was a very angry man (he once threw a book at me) and was usually seething about what he saw as my completely misplaced confidence and independence. After three years, we had enough work to hire an office helper; but I was not assigned to be her supervisor. This was actually fine with me because I was busy managing a family and writing on the side. You hire a poet at your peril, and I don’t think I could conceal my distaste for office politics. Office Helper observed this dynamic and began immediately planning to take my job. This only worked briefly – once I was pushed out she lasted a month.
I was determined to keep up the good relationships I’d forged, but it turned out to be impossible. Their world was just not my world. In the meantime I had one child in college and another finishing high school – I thought I might make it on a part-time job and on paper I certainly had the skills. The weird interplay with my ex-boss – officially fatherly yet boiling with suppressed sexual rage – gave me an idea for a novel.
Seawracked
He lost her Spoke too soon As men are wont Words freighted by an inner logic Fell to earth and lay Prey to busy bristle-footed worms Tidily dismantle Subject, verb & predicate; Sucked out sense and left The elegiac bones to rot Amid kelp-wigged rock & glass-rope sponge Cheek by jowl with Long dead fishermen’s wives Punished now for ill-set dough and Worse-set hair Mouths agape in imitation of The badly sutured wounds of childbirth Secrets told; corpses left to nourish Nature’s counting-house One season only; sharing space With shattered petrels Feathers spewed like pillow-stuffing In passing frenzy of love-struck boy s- Strewn among the shavings of these once great ships Built by hearts & backs of men Who loved their daughters far too well – Losing them to sailors Crueler than the great sea-god himself; He who stirs our sleep these nights With grief-crazed cries of loons Casting on the waters for their Far-flung children Lost forever now As we are lost as He lost her.
