Introducing the June 2023 issue of Worlds of Possibility
Happy Juneteenth! The June 2023 issue of Worlds of Possibility is now available for subscribers! If you would like to get a copy, you can subscribe at any time on juliarios.com and visit the June issue page to download it in ebook and PDF formats.
Subscribers may also download the August 2022 issue, the October 2022 issue, the December 2022 issue, the February 2023 issue, and the April 2023 issue.
It's been an exciting time over here! The Worlds of Possibility anthology Kickstarter funded at the end of May, and I have been busy getting the anthology together, reading poetry submissions (which are still open until the end of this month!), and ordering stickers and postcards for backers who chose art rewards.
This third issue of 2023 features five stories, six poems, and two original pieces of art. There are also several stock images inside, and some of them warrant special attention, but more on that below!
Below is the editor's note I included in this issue.
Welcome to the June 2023 issue of Worlds of Possibility. This ebook version is only available to paid subscribers, but all the contents inside will eventually be released free to the public on https://www.juliarios.com/ and on the OMG Julia Podcast. If you enjoy what I do with this project, please tell others. Subscriptions make it possible for me to continue paying creators for new work. For those who can’t afford to pay for a subscription, subscribing for free to the OMG Julia Podcast also helps!
The cover for this issue features stock art by Milo Wren, aka PocketMilo. I found Milo’s art on Canva, and I loved his dedication to queer and trans joy, so I looked him up and found his website at pocketmilo.com, and I wanted to share it with you! If you love the queer couple embracing on this issue’s cover, check out Milo’s other work, and consider leaving him a tip.
This issue spans June and July, the brightest of summer months where I live! June here is Pride Month, so I knew I wanted to celebrate lots of different kinds of LGBTQ+ lives. We start off this issue with a poem by R. B. Lemberg. R. B. originally posted this poem on their Patreon, and I love it, so I asked if I could reprint it. I decided to go all out with making it a full page illustration. All the art for this is composed of stock images I combined to make a full blown queer joy extravaganza.
Though I usually don’t credit stock artists, in this case, I wanted to specifically draw your attention to two of the contributors. First, once again, is Milo Wren, whose “Nurtured Bodies House Plant With Trans Rights Sticker”, “Nurtured Bodies Trans Joy”, and “Nurtured Bodies Trans Femme Person” make up part of the frame. Second is El Chico Maravilla, an artist from Spain whose “Modern Fairytale Royals”, “Modern Fairytale Potion”, and “Modern Fairytale Couple” are also included. You can find El Chico Maravilla on Instagram as @soy.chico.maravilla and you can also buy prints on the chicomaravilla Etsy shop.
R. B. Lemberg’s beautiful poem kicks us off, but this queer joy party is just getting started! In this issue, you’ll also find sapphic stories like “The Ng Yut Queen (The 五 月 Queen)” by Eliza Chan and “Flowers With Teeth” by Jenn Reese, and trans and non-binary joy in the poem “She Says” by Winifred Yost, and the stories “Prep Luay” by Jeané D. Ridges and “Top Reviews of the Sweet Beauty Bakery, Home of Extraordinary Gender Reveal Cakes” by Jo Miles. Thanks to the success of the Worlds of Possibility anthology kickstarter, the illustration for Jo’s story, which I designed using stock art, will soon be a sticker! Backers who chose the art reward level will get it first, but I may make extras available for others later.
June here also brings our newest federal holiday, Juneteenth. This holiday commemorates the anniversary of emancipation in the United States (it took us the better part of two centuries to make this a federal holiday, but we finally have), and so I knew I also wanted to center a few Black voices in this issue. In addition to “Prep Luay” by Jeané D. Ridges, we also have poems by Q. Imagine and Zaynab Iliyasu Bobi. Not all of these are US voices, but they’re all worth listening to and celebrating.
Q. Imagine helps us slip into our best summer vibes with her two pieces at the beginning and end of this issue, and other summery pieces include Matthew Berg’s “Flying” with an illustration by Andrew Turok, and Kilmeny MacMichael’s “Friends” about a pair of platonic buddies who love to share a cup noodle every morning. Why is that summery? You should read it to find out!
