iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 23/03/2025

meta is pushing me to chat with AI narcissist therapist or AI egg :/

ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 16/03/2025

new poem out with anodyne mag — would love if people stopped the “when are you having babies” question so i can stop saying “i can’t” 🙂‍↕️

Are You Trying to Get Pregnant l ari b. cofer
once, at nineteen, before gerald and i could afford
Plan B, i took seven birth control pills and almost passed out
on the walk home. gerald carried me up the stairs and
tucked me into bed.
if i were ever to get pregnant, i would have wanted it to
have been
in that moment, in the texas pressure cooker heat, on my
twin-sized bed.
i would have asked him to fuck me again, this time, for
real, because
i would have loved being a parent if all it meant to be a
mother was to
love someone enough to carry them home.

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 01/03/2025

new piece out today with Everscribe Magazine 🫶🏽

a screenshot of the poem “if i see the priest now, maybe forgiveness can help me forget” by ari b. cofer, published in everscribe magazine

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 14/02/2025

what a life we’ve lived, what a love we’ve made

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 14/02/2025

ten years of being in love with my valentine

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 13/02/2025

In WHAT ABOUT FRANKIE?, Naomi finds a platonic soulmate in the boy next door until circumstance forces the two to grow up, grow without, and decide if history is enough to continue to grow together. ☀️ Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret x We Are All So Good at Smiling ☀️ Black/queer rep #questpit

a photo collage of quotes and other images of friends together from pinterest

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 05/02/2025

wrote about my relationship to sex over on substack + how complicated it can be when hypersexuality mixes with depression. sometimes it’s hard talking ab this stuff but i also know it is so so important to be honest ab it

Before I understood the gravity of someone else's touch, sex was something of a game to me. In undergrad, the boys in the dorm across the street had a list of places they hoped to fuck before the end of the year, and I was more than happy to help them meet their goals. In the bookstore parking garage?
Check. On a piano in the music hall practice rooms? I'll deny it. In the chapel? Couldn't ever get past the chaplain.

I've spent a lot of time unpacking why it felt like the first time I had autonomy over my body was when it was praised by a man who, if I'd met him just one year earlier, would have been considered a predator. Sex can be a way to reclaim your body in the same way that it can be a quick way to lose it. Looking back, it feels like I achieved both that day — I allowed myself to feel good, and I was consumed entirely by a man who wanted something young and vulnerable.

I think a lot about my 18-year-old self, who wanted nothing more than to be wanted and would patiently wait for anyone who asked them to. There was a fine line between liberation and self-harm, between pleasure and danger. For all the experiences that I consented to, I can't say I regret them. It was fun to feel something, to let someone feel my body, and to help others feel something because of what my body could do.
But today, sometimes I still feel sore from the work it took to walk that tightrope and not fall onto the wrong side of the bed. I kiss my husband and my friends and remind myself that it is okay to give myself to others as long as I remember to keep parts of myself for myself, too.

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 12/01/2025

also new in Shō Poetry Journal —

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 12/01/2025

2017 (BA) // 2025 (MFA) 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️

a photo of poet ari b. cofer on the baylor university campus in their graduation regalia

a photo of poet ari b. cofer on the randolph college campus in their graduation regalia

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 08/01/2025

i got my masters degree (ari b. cofer, mfa 🙂‍↕️)

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 30/12/2024

excerpts from todays substack that manifested after listening to Growing Up Is Hard by Chelsea Cutler on loop for 2 hours

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 27/11/2024

this week makes four years without self-harm and i talked about that (and how mental health has impacted my relationship) over on substack today 💗

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 22/11/2024

new author photos just dropped like …….. hello. i am a bad bitch and i also write books

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 18/11/2024

if u become my friend expect me to almost exclusively write h*rny love poems about you (published earlier this year in @passionfruitlit.bsky.social 🫶🏽)

a screenshot of a poem title by ari b. cofer published on The Passionfruit Review

a screenshot of a poem by ari b. cofer published on The Passionfruit Review

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 18/11/2024

my fridge exactly one minute after my edible hits

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 17/11/2024

i love writing but hate when i’m drafting and whatever im processing irl unexpectedly appears in the WIP and makes me cry. it feels like this

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 15/11/2024

today’s poem of the day is by Akwaeke Emezi from Content Warning: Everything

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 15/11/2024

remembered the before and after the poetry reading selfies, but neglected to take one while i was there so you have to take my word when i say it was wonderful and i feel so warm and fuzzy after reading to a beautiful and kind group of seattle queers

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 14/11/2024

thinking about this day a while back when i checked in on my husband bc his mood was low and his response reminded me why i married him

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 14/11/2024

hey quick q if you have a cat how do you get your writing done because i achieved a measly 127 words before she interrupted and now i cant move

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 14/11/2024

this poem also lives rent-free in my brain. it gets me every single time

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 14/11/2024

thinking about this poem today — thank you universe for Lucille Clifton

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ari b. cofer @aribcofer.com · 14/11/2024

i don’t know if bluesky targets the local algorithm, but if it does and any poetry-loving queers in Seattle see this, i’m reading tomorrow at Charlie’s Queer Books and would love to see ur beautiful face there 🫶🏽

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