This year we have the pleasure of publishing more pamphlets, specifically by queer poets who offer an insight into their search for safety and chosen family. Today we release Life Goals of the Millennials: or The Commune Manifesto by Scottish DIY punk poet Ross McFarlane. this call-to-arms of a generation forced into unstable housing, and shared living well into their 30’s and 40’s for the working classes. Ross brings tenderness and fun to the experience, finding home and support in the collective, and shows how communal living is both a radical act, and a necessity for queer people who search for their own families.

Life Goals of the Millennials: or The Commune Manifesto is about growing up queer and not growing out of it. In The Commune we champion platonic love and commitment. We tell stories, find good in those around us, holdfast our beliefs and each other, and we face down the practicalities of a world not made for us.
The Commune Manifesto has taken shape over 10 years of late-night conversations in Glasgow tenements. It is dedicated to every beautiful soul who feels lost on their own, or terrified of losing their community as they grow older and feel the pressure to settle down. Finally, it is a personal statement of intent, an affirmation, a life goal, to retain the joy that comes from our hardfought and close-knit bonds. These poems visualise the hope we have in a future together.

Come join us in the Commune.

“Ross’ performances are filled with electricity, bouncing from his lips to his fingers into the audience and back. This pamphlet is buzzing with the same foot-stomping energy, and chock-full off heartwarming wholesomeness and queer love. His poetry is honest to the bone and just as raw. It is an ode to a generation that doesn’t have much, but that has each other, and storytellers like Ross to document it all.” 

Bibi June

6th June – Candlelight Open Mic X ‘Life Goals of the Millennials: or The Commune Manifesto’ Pamphlet Launch, The Old Toll Bar, Glasgow

Ross McFarlane writes soft and kind stories which he yells in a weak Glaswegian accent far too fast for anyone to understand. He wants to write with the perfect simplicity of ONSIND, stir up heady excitement in a crowd like Laura Jane Grace, and draw you slowly into a Craig Finn-esk world of his own creation.

Self-styled “Glasgow’s No. 1 Support Act”, Ross has opened for touring poets and musicians alike including; Sabrina Benaim, Shane Koyczan, Rudy Fransisco, Rae Spoon, Petrol Girls, Throw Me Off The Bridge, and Jesus and his Judgmental Father. Catch him on the MegaBuses searching for touring musicians to accost with poetry.

Check out more stories by Ross through In The Works spoken word theatre company, where he has written for and performed in productions including A Matter of Time and The 900 Club, as well as touring the UK and Ireland with millennial drama Make/Shift. He is a writer and producer on queer horror audio drama Folxlore, which has won the Audio Verse Award for Best New Storytelling Production, and featured in The Atlantic’s 50 Best Podcasts of 2020.

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