185. Weaving a great cloth } a crimson cloak.

Read Tatiana Dubin’s “fictionalized essay”—i.e. hybrid non/fiction published by new New York journal Xeno.

The journal looks good. Dubin’s essay, “I Am a Daughter of the Hebrews, but I Am Fleeing from Them” is great—it maps Judith, the Hebrew beheadress of Holofernes, to Beth Berenson, an Israeli pageant winner who runs away. It’s about weaponized beauty and ordinary cruelty. Holofernes’ head on a platter. Or in a sack. Served with bitters.


[ image: bust of Helen of Troy by Antonio Canova (replica), circa 1812. ]