Bellmusker 

84 creative works found

• scorpio
  by bellmusker

  Today you will dream in Russian and wake with the smell of vanilla.

• regeneration
  by bellmusker

  I almost touched someone today / Almost

  One of the blessings of agoraphobia – and yes, there are a few – is that it gifts you with a finely tuned awareness of safe spaces. Watching life pass by my porch was both a tantalising and yet devastating reminder of what I was unable to embrace. I couldn’t leave my house for an appallingly long time, and I’m still dealing with the intimacy that encompasses reconnecting with people. I still have a lot to learn.

• poison & sunlit fur
  by bellmusker

  You buy your first stilettos, four inches high and fire engine red. You can’t quite strut in them yet, but you will.

  The world breaks everyone, and many are strong at the broken places. / Ernest Hemingway I hid this for a long time. Mostly because I sent it off to a publisher, but also because it’s without a doubt my most personal piece on RB. It was accepted by the publisher and recently I read it aloud at the book launch. Yasemin Sumner (who also had a story published in the same book) and Luckyvegetable said my voice didn’t tremble at all. I think they were being kind. After all, when you read your diary out to a room full of strangers, you’re allowed to shake a bit.

• an antidote to pears
  by bellmusker

  wicked wench & wise woman

  Wise advice from a friend’s father: / Never fall in love with a man’s potential.

• songs of spine & salt
  by bellmusker

  brush my hair aside / & read the stories in my bones

  for those with songs for me….....past, present & future

• 

  Bathtub Portraiture #11
  by Jessica Tremp

  Much love to our beautiful, firey, warmhearted medusa , who is liquorice allsorts, minus the pink entire bathtub portraiture series

• 

  Medusa
  by Jessica Tremp

  medusa

• the book of blood and snow
  by bellmusker

  She dotted her i’s with little circles. I fucking hate that.

  What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love Fyodor Dostoyevsky

• Lilith stole the fire of hell to lure the bees
  by bellmusker

  I smoulder when placed in front of windows

  While the rest of the species is descended from apes, redheads are descended from cats / Mark Twain I don’t know how many girls you dated, man / But you ain’t lived ‘til you’ve had your tires rotated / By a redheaded woman / It takes a redheaded woman / To get a dirty job done Bruce Springsteen During the Spanish Inquisition flame colored hair was evidence that its owner had stolen the fire of hell and had to be burned as a witch Bees are thought to sting redheads more than others Redhaired people never can make good butter. The butter always has a slight tang about it / British superstition The red-haired of both sexes are more libidinous and mischievous than the rest / Jonathan Swift in “Gulliver’s Travels” If you pass a redhead in the street you are to spit and turn around / Corsican superstition There was never a saint with red hair / Russian proverb Only two things are necessary to keep a redhead happy. One is to let her think she is having her own way, and the other is to let her have it / Unknown

• red sugar
  by bellmusker

  Some girls just stick in your throat, and you can’t wash them down.

  It’s so dark inside the wolf / Brothers Grimm When I moved home from Europe and unpacked my boxes, I found my red coat again Her red coat, really. I was nineteen the last time I’d worn it so I didn’t scowl at the loose button, or how it stretched across the bust. She was always much skinnier than me, after all, especially once the wolf came knocking. She’d told me she’d come back for it. It’s just that she didn’t have the money for him, and he was knocking soon, and she really, really needed him tonight. And I could take the coat as payment, if only I’d answer the knock for the both of us. She’d come back for it; of course she would. I keep the collar turned up when I wear it now, at 36. Sometimes, I don’t even feel the cold. But other times, I feel it in my bones.

• my inky mouth
  by bellmusker

  Right down the length of your shuddering spine

  Sometimes the muse just wants to play with you. You should always let her. Otherwise she gets cranky; and that ain’t pretty.

• the growling goddess of chinatown
  by bellmusker

  For one red moment she thinks she might kick the door in.

  Brigit (breo-aigit / breo-shaigit ) – “fiery arrow” Many myths revolve around the goddess Brigit. Some say there are three incarnations; one in charge of writing and inspiration, who invented the Ogham alphabet; one in charge of healing; and the third in charge of fiery transformation. Only call on the third when you truly need her. She’s a handful. The further adventures of bell’s brigit.

• to the year of water off my back
  by bellmusker

  I saw written on my palm / One word

  My spine is extremely straight, and I tend to hiss. Gets kinda tiring. For Lisa & Jess, who deflect my arrows with love and humour, and who gave me the resolution for 2009: / Be like the duck, and rethink the crumpets If I do learn not to fire up so easily, can I skip the crumpet part?!

• 

  pull into shape and lay flat
  by Jo O'Brien

  Model: Bellmusker / Photography: Jo O’Brien / The whole series

• 

  Untitled
  by LittleHelen

  breathe girl….. COME ON!

• the kohl girl & her lime pips
  by bellmusker

  I’m allergic to purple and terrifying to Virgos.

  A full moon and scorching summer night make my muse playful. She’s a frisky one. If only flirtation could be this much fun, hey?

• Little Helen interviews Bellmusker
  by community

  Little Helen has been a RedBubbler since July 2007 and is the queen of the RB interview. Sh…

  Little Helen has been a RedBubbler since July 2007 and is the queen of the RB interview. She’s uncannily good at charming her subjects into revealing all sorts of juicy details about themselves. Bellmusker is an “authoress” extraordinaire who joined RedBubble in April 2007. She has been involved in organising the Melbourne Writers’ Meets for the past 18 months and has made a wonderful contribution to the writing community on RedBubble. So pour yourself a refreshing beverage, sit back and enjoy as the sophisticated misfit interviews the one who’s afraid of crumpets. / / Little Helen: Bell … how much life has changed for you since you first joined RedBubble? / / Bellmusker: My two years on RB have brought so many changes – I can barely imagine my life without it! I’d never put my writing out into the world before posting my first piece, ‘Fire’, and I can see such a progression between that and my present writing. Having a close community of writers to workshop with has been invaluable for my craft and my confidence, and I became brave enough to actually send my work to publishers. Since I joined I’ve had nine stories accepted for publication, I’m now working on a novel, and I’ve been asked to speak at the Melbourne Emerging Writers’ Festival I’ll be discussing writers’ groups and their magic, so RB will definitely get mentioned! On a personal level it’s been invaluable – it’s brought several people into my life that I now consider my closest friends. I went through a particularly dark period of agoraphobia in my twenties and when I joined, I was still living in its shadow: I wasn’t the most social of creatures. Having the inspiration and support of these amazing artists has really helped me to step back into the world with my head held high. The Melbourne group in particular is extremely vibrant, and not a week goes by that I don’t catch up with someone for drinks and laughter. I’ve just returned from Canberra to visit the glorious Holly Ringland, and you and I are headed to the States in a few weeks to strut through the streets of New York with the divine MsTrace – cannot wait! Joining RB has opened my life up in ways I’d never envisioned when I clicked that first upload button. / / / LH: You began organising Writers’ Meets for Melbourne RedBubblers (and should be credited for that) a while ago now. How are they going and have they been successful for you? / / B: The meetings are wonderful! The Melbourne Writers’ Group meets on the first Sunday of each month at a pub in Northcote, and we all look forward to it. It’s open to all writers and we’ve even been host to several interstate visitors, your fine self included. It’s a fabulous opportunity to read your work aloud, ask for advice and critique, pass on recommendations of writers (both on RB and off) and generally swill an indulgent amount of mulled wine and laugh to the high heavens. / / I love these meetings and have been hosting them for 18 months now. Some are intimate little gatherings of half a dozen scribes; the largest was 21 writers gathered around a huge table in the beer garden with cameras flashing and notebooks filling. So much fun! If you’ve ever been tempted to come along, take a look at the Writers’ Forum in the Melbourne and Victoria group for details, and accounts of previous meetings. Feel free to mail me with any questions, and I’ll make sure that your glass is always full and everyone knows your name. What are you waiting for?! / / / LH: How did you feel meeting a RedBubbler for the first time and who was it? / / B: My first meeting was on the steps of Flinders Street Station almost two years ago. I lingered at Fed Square, watching the red balloons held by Jo O’Brien and trying to decide if I would cross over. I did, and the rest is history. So I actually think Jo was my first ever bubbler, which is fitting considering how much she’s helped lured me out of my shell. I also recall Paul Louis Villani’s beaming grin (and I just realised that was also his first RB meeting). That day introduced me to two of my best friends: Jessica Tremp, who spoke German with me and leapt in the air for photos, and LisaG, who lingered up the back and hid from the cameras with me. In the early days I scowled at everyone who pointed a lens my way, but have since loosened up considerably and even done some RB modelling – amazing for me. / / / LH: Where does Bell’s heart dwell? / / B: With one foot firmly planted on the cobblestones of Brussels, and the other on the bank of the Yarra in Melbourne. I’ve always been torn between these two incredible cities, and I think I’ll always be going back and forth between them, as I’ve done for years. That said, next year I’m moving to Berlin for a stretch, as she has her hooks well and truly in me. And I loooooove the German language. / / / LH: Memories … we all hold them close. What is one of your happiest? / / BM: Every time I step onto the Grote Markt, the stunning medieval market square in Brussels that’s my favourite place in the world, my eyes well with joyful tears. However, I’d have to say that first email from an editor telling me that amongst one thousand submissions, they’d accepted my work for publication in “Going Down Swinging”, will never fade from my memory. There was clutching, there was squealing, and there might have even been a happy dance! Having my writing validated by professional editors is not something I’ll forget; it was the first time I thought hell, maybe I can actually do this. / / / LH: Name two things you could not live without? / / B: The glorious sunlight at dusk, when it falls golden on the bricks and makes my red hair look as though it’s caught fire. When I feel low, I take a walk at this time of night and feel suddenly able to breathe again. Never fails. Second, I’m going to have to say a pen in my bag, behind my ear, between my fingers: I’m always writing, scribbling down overheard conversations and titles for stories. And then there’s the quotes – you’ve seen my little red book of quotes come out at bubble meetings!! I always need a red moleskin and pen nearby, and can’t leave the house without them. Because no matter how much I say “I’m sure I’ll remember that later”, I rarely do without pinning it down in ink. / / / LH: A song that will forever be ‘your song’? / / B: Oh lord, that’s a big ask. I want to speak of the amazing Lunachicks, Supersuckers or Mahalia Jackson, but I’m a blues woman at heart and I have to say that I listen to “Crawling King Snake” by Etta James at least once a day. It’s an intense, dark, and immensely seductive song that holds rich memories for me. / / / LH: What are your plans for the future, professionally and personally? / / B: Professionally, I want to make my name as a writer. I first told my parents at seven that I was going to be “an authoress” when I grew up, hehe, and I’ve been a devoted ink spiller since then. I got my start writing for punk zines, and now with a degree in Linguistics behind me and a novel in progress, as long as I can weave words between my fingertips I’m happy. / / Personally? Well, that’s a little harder to say. I have an illness that I struggle with and though I thought I had it under control, it flared up this year and knocked me back underground for a while. I tend to write of snakes quite often and for me they symbolise both my illness and the potential for regeneration, so when I write of my snakes hissing it’s a general indication that I’m not doing well. My relapse has taught me I can never get cocky about it, so keeping my demons down is a constant aim for me. Also, the resolution was given to me to make this ‘the year of the duck’, namely, let things roll off my back a bit more; I tend to fire up easily. I’m not quite sure how I’m going with that! And I absolutely intend to move to Berlin next year, if only for six months, to get my dose of that beautiful language and sit in Bebelplatz with gingerbread and coffee and pour words out. / Bellmusker, Little Helen and a number of martinis … If you’d like to read more of Little Helen’s interviews, her RedBubble Hottest 100 series isn’t a bad place to start. If you’d like to find out more about the Melbourne Writers’ Meet, visit the Melbourne and Victoria group’s Writers’ Forum for more info.

• scopperloit
  by bellmusker

  I can say that, because it’s just between us

• the taste of red
  by bellmusker

  The red snakes are the most delicious.

  Phodophobia – Fear of the colour red / Nomatophobia – Fear of names / Thaasophobia – Fear of sitting / Euphobia – Fear of hearing good news / Nostophobia – Fear of returning home / Clinophobia – Fear of going to bed / Heliophobia – Fear of the sun / Panophobia – Fear of everything / Luposlipaphobia — the fear of being pursued by timber wolves around a kitchen table while wearing socks on a newly-waxed floor

• those fig mornings
  by bellmusker

  I tend to look away from you. I tend to blush.

  A work of fiction, for once. If only tram rides were really this enjoyable….....

• 

  I dream of red letters and snakes
  by jemimalovesbigted

  I had the most delightful pleasure of being able to take a portrait of the most gorgeous and talented Bell last night. She was so kind as to let me into her home, but not only that, help me drag in all my equipment and then let me rearrange her lounge room, and all of it done with a big smile, good humor and the offer of a glass of red wine. Which of course I took with great delight. Thank you so much sweetheart for allowing me to invade your space. I only hope I did your beauty and light justice with my humble photography…. xxx

• 

  red was her dress
  by jemimalovesbigted

  ...

• red poppy song
  by bellmusker

  We know better.

  It’s Hallowe’en this weekend in the northern hemisphere, and Beltaine in the southern. It’s traditionally a time to embrace the darkness, and then release it. It’s harder than it seems, sometimes.

• the kohl girl & her mermaid tattoos
  by bellmusker

  My hobbies are wig spotting and eating red fruit.

  I think I like this girl…..a continuation of The kohl girl & her lime pips. Something playful to welcome summer.