PTK is at AWP!
Meet Sophie Crocker 💕+ a message from Kelly 💌
Hello Poetry friends! Larissa here! How are you all doing?
This email is here to let you know some orders of business (or OOBS as we’ve been known to call it at PTK HQ).
Firstly, we have a message from Kelly Mullins, our glorious co-founder and poet-Girlboss extraordinaire:
Hi, everyone! Kelly here. Long time, no poem. Thanks for your patience and understanding as Larissa and I have taken the time to rest and recover after a busy year.
I wanted to write to let you know that I will be * officially * stepping down from my duties as editor at PTK. What does that mean for PTK? Larissa will continue to run the platform, and will be back at it when she is feeling recharged.
It’s been a wonderful ride, and I’m so proud of everything we’ve created together. PTK is no longer just two people, but an entire, globe-spanning (hot poet) community - which I know will continue to thrive in and off this platform!
I’ll still be doing some poet stuff online and around Amsterdam, so if you want to stay in touch, feel free to follow me on instagram @kellmullins and substack Kelly Mullins .
<3 K
Kelly, we will miss you so much! 🥲🥹
You might be wondering:
Is someone replacing Kelly?
What does this mean for PTK?
Who the fuck is Sophie?
I thought you said this was an AWP announcement? (+ Wtf is AWP)
So, let’s answer your pressing questions:
Is Someone Replacing Kelly?
No one is replacing Kelly! There’s no replacement for her! We played around with many ideas on how to make the project work with our bigger time zone difference, increased personal workload, and the growing responsibility we felt to our community. We even discussed adding a third and keeping Kelly on at a reduced level of commitment to the project, however Kelly finally chose to step down from the project for these and other personal reasons in around November last year and blessed me to continue rearing our baby with sole custody.
What does this mean for PTK?
When Kelly left, I must admit I was lost. I didn't want to or know how to continue PTK without my better half. I had already known from the start that PTK doesn’t make sense as Larissa’s Vanity Project (I have enough of those as is), so I knew it couldn't stay just mine. At the same time it felt strange, treasonous even, to carry on without Kelly, to invite someone else to co-parent our baby with us.
For a long time I wrestled with these feelings (along with the generalized despair, hopelessness, depression, and grief that have become deeply embedded into my daily life as I watch the world change). It was too much change too fast, so I took my time.
I put PTK aside for a moment, and focused instead on my own growing community of local Hot Poets. My new friends, colleagues, and peers in Vancouver were my support system throughout this time which helped me remembered why Kelly and I started this in the first place.
PTK was always meant to be an exercise in community building and engagement, call and response poetry, and the crafting of alternative publishing and performance spaces for Hot Poets. So, here we are, with our new friend Sophie, keeping with the spirit of the project that Kelly and started! Which leads us to…
Who the fuck is Sophie?
to answer your question in fancy lit bio terms:
Sophie Crocker is an MFA candidate at the University of British Columbia. Her previous publications include Best Canadian Poetry 2023, The Adroit Journal, The Ex-Puritan, The Fiddlehead, and elsewhere. Find her on Bluesky, X, and Instagram: @goblinpuck. Order her debut poetry collection via her website, sophiecrocker.com, or anywhere books are sold.
To answer your question in PTK terms:
Sophie is cut from the same sticker book as Kelly and I! Sophie’s work is bubbling with images of fem nostalgia, gender fluidity, macabre humor, rats and not a zero sum amount of violence and death (literally all we love at PTK). She is hilarious, caring, sweet, and fearless. We share a love for Community (the TV show) and community (the abstract concept). Her poetry book was called Brat way before Charlie made it cool.
I met Sophie during our MFA new students orientation, and I immediately had a poetry crush! I gave her a Hot Poets sticker and she gave me a holographic rat one! Since then I've been so lucky to share many classes with her and have only fallen more in love with her work and her brain!
For the record: I met Sophie long before Kelly told me she was stepping down, and even back then we were floating ideas about how to add Sophie to our Trapper Keeper; we discussed bringing her in as a future resident or even as a potential third! This is ethical non-monogamy! No drama here!
If I must carry on without Kelly (cue my Venus in Cancer melodrama), then it has to be with Sophie (who also has a Venus in Cancer)!
Please give Sophie a Hot Poet welcome in the comments! 💕💚💞💚💓💚
Wait, isn't this an AWP announcement? 🤔
And wtf is AWP?
AWP is a writer conference which will be taking place this week in LA! And Yes! Consider it announced! PTK will be at AWP!
(Well, Sophie will be there! I chose not to go because of current political climate, as well as I didn’t want to risk running into my Gemini ex!)
Sophie is gonna be on our Instagram account sharing some cool conference content (and cute LA golden hour selfies I’m sure). So if you’re at the conference and/or in the Los Angeles area and want one of our iconic butt stickers, dm us! We would love to connect!
(If you’re so lucky to run into Sophie, you will quickly realize how lucky PTK is to have her now!)
I’ve been putting off these announcements as they are all bittersweet.
I am scared of doing this without Kelly, and I will miss her tremendously (already do) and love her eternally. Please follow her on IG to continue seeing her amazing work!
I am so looking forward to properly introduce y’all to Sophie via an interview and (ofc) poems soon (very soon, hopefully, this semester is kicking our butts). Please welcome her to the project with love and openness!
I’m nervous and excited to see what this new shared future holds! I am so happy to continue building this project! Sophie and I are planning so much! Workshops! Events! Stand-up poetry performances! Poems! And so, so much more!
I am so grateful for the patience of everyone involved in this, Kelly’s, Sophie’s, and yours as a reader! Thank you for staying with us! Please do stick around!
Look at me learning to hold multiple emotions at once (making my therapist proud)!
Love you! See you soon! See Sophie and PTK in LA!
Eternal love and poetry,
Larissa
💕💕💕💕
TRULY THE END OF AN ERA 🥲💗