Indigo Aves Publishes in Wailing and Gnashing Literary Magazine

Last spring, English Department undergraduate student Indigo Aves took a horse production practices class, which inspired their poem “friendship of horses.” This piece was recently published in the literary magazine Wailing and Gnashing, which was born from Utah’s underground art scene and focuses on poetry.

In reflecting on the poem and its inspiration, Indigo notes, “I was so surprised by the trust I was allowed with my limited experience, and interacting with the horses felt really special. I have been dealing with the loss of a friendship that was really important to me, and this combination of dreams, physicality, and apprehension is created out of that.”

Derived from the phrase “wailing and gnashing of teeth,” the literary magazine places its acceptances into two categories: the wailers and the gnashers. Indigo’s piece was accepted as a wailer, which the magazine’s website defines as “raw, unfiltered, and unrefined. These are the poems that didn’t just leap out of your brain, they clawed their way up and out of you to claim a space on the page and now refuse to be moved.”

For Indigo, getting their first poem published is encouraging as they continue their craft. “It’s an interesting feeling to have one of my poems, which are so closely personal, put out into the world,” they reflect. “I have a hard time believing in my own writing, so having this poem published is a reassurance to me that there is an audience out there who want to consume the things I create.”