Millie Saint-James is a queer writer based in Czechia, though they have lived all over the world, from the velds of Namibia to the metropolis of Osaka. They currently live with their fur son in a one room apartment, performing magic, and writing about queer futures.

 

I only started writing poetry recently. I’ve known I was queer since I was sixteen, but it took until I moved away from the US for me to actually begin to come out and accept who I was.

A year and a half ago, I moved to Prague, Czech Republic, where I vowed to be Out. Out as bi, Out as nonbinary, just Out.
I started writing poetry then, because even being Out, I couldn’t always express myself and my feelings.
About a year ago I started my first serious relationship with someone who wasn’t a cis man, so it meant a lot to me. Despite all of it’s ups and downs, despite it’s disastrous ending, it helped me come into myself more.
The poem I submitted is from a series I was working on during our relationship, as winter gave way to spring. Things were already pretty bad then, but we kept trying. I tried to make that futility come through. I wanted to express the good and the bad of queer relationships. The joy and the pain. 
I’m not only a poet. I actually spend most of my time writing queer SFF. When I write a story, I have a message, a feeling I want to leave in the hearts and minds of readers. It’s usually something about hope and kindness; that even when the world is ending, the least we can do is offer these things to each other. Unfortunately, real life doesn’t work that way. Real people don’t have the time and luxury to plan out their actions the way I do for my characters.
Poetry is where I feel like I can stretch and express the emotions that come from that disconnect. My relationship ended badly and I probably won’t talk to my ex again, and I would never write that in a novel. But I can write it in my poems. I can get that catharsis. Express the real ups and downs of being a queer person who loved another queer person, and lost.
Millie Saint James and other poets work can be found in SMITTEN coming out very shortly (this month). SMITTEN will be available via Amazon and all good book stores. Please follow the FB SMITTEN page for updates and more information.

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