Herstory

Father dead, when I was nine. Mother weak, a bit emotional, perhaps touched. Found a new Bob, a self-made man, so she said. He didn’t like me much. Said I was ugly, dirty, nothing but a failure, unworthy of his home, his goodwill, of no use at all. He beat me, rag doll slapped against a wall and what did my mother do? Stared at the floor.

At sixteen, I left with a boy. Hitched a ride to the city in a pickup truck that smelled of dead chickens. We married, had children. Your mama and uncle they both came out looking the same. Too dark to amount to much. Too poor to be anything more.

I took care of the children, fed them, made sure they were properly dressed. What about that scrawny dark boy I married, that weakling whose body never developed to anything more than a face full of whiskers, who was too skinny for manual labor, too stupid for an office job?  Most of the time we didn’t see him for days. When he’d finally show up, he’d win the children over with a bag full of brown bananas.

Never mind about him, I did alright with your mama. She learned to cook and clean before she could add and subtract. But my boy, your uncle, he was my biggest disappointment. I had hoped to groom him into the proper man. But how do you create someone you know nothing about?

When he was eight, he began to sneak away at night. He believed he could swallow life up in one gulp. He didn’t stand a chance against the world.

They say, without destruction nothing is born but they forget to tell you that sometimes what’s born is already dead.

Your mama, she watched and listened. She learned from her brother’s mistakes. Swore her allegiance to school, sports, church and me. I chose the right man for your mama, tall, white enough, from a foreign country. I pushed her away from me whenever I had a chance. It was the least I could do for her.

When you were born, I told your mama, “Don’t let her out of your sight.” And she listened. Took me literally. Locked you away in that one-bedroom apartment with only your books and a TV.

Knowing nothing of the world is a luxury, a gift. But you don’t want to hear about my greatest success. Instead you ask me to tell you about the past that I want to forget.

Five Stories of Love and Heartbreak

1. Boy chases girl.  Boy gets girl. Boy grows tired of girl.
2. Girl tries to run from boy. Girl wants more than boy can offer. Girl settles for boy.
3. Girl and boy love each other without loving each other.
4. Boy wants sex but not with girl. Girl wants sex but not with boy.
5. Boy wants things the way they were. Girl wants to recapture what she gave up.

Birthing

The image communicates everything. She moves the camera closer, stealthily, so as to not interrupt the act taking place. She stops six feet from her subject and zooms in. A blur of gray and black sharpens into fur. A heaving abdomen. Pan down to a sac with something moving inside it. A small body peeks out from a small opening. The camera stops. The gravel is cutting into her knees.

Interference means corruption of the image. She relinquished her right to feel and presses the record button on the camera. The stray cat lets out a long sigh. She has no interest in these sounds of birthing only in the image.

Editing destroys truth. At school the next day, she sits alone in the computer lab. She transfers an hour of footage into the computer, waits for the upload, then watches the footage. She relived the birthing one more time. She chooses not to edit the moments when the camera moves and shifts out of focus.

Greatness is often misunderstood. Later in class she’s called up last by the professor. She’s not surprised. She’s developed a reputation in class. Her films are too long, too raw. Her refusal to edit is anti-cinematic. She might as well take a shit on Eisenstein’s grave. All three films she’s shot this semester have been of births: hamsters, rabbits, cats. She’s working her way up the ladder. All three films were shot without sound.

Daydreaming at the Supermarket

Man Ray

beat up shopping carts
stray cats rummaging inside
cardboard boxes
dented cars parked in front
two older women standing
waiting for their rides
teenagers on their break
arguing over a last cigarette
cashiers discuss the meaning of
discipline at the workplace
pigeons flying around
carefree
without responsibilities
shitting all over the place
a cop sitting on the hood of his car
writing out traffic tickets
talking into his radio
codes that mean something to
someone
stripes on the streets
appear in colors too bright
a reminder of perception
how it makes life more difficult
more complex
harder to deal with
others can’t understand this switch
in a point of view
the purpose of a decision
which may not have a purpose after all
except to avoid confrontation
apathy
how is it possible to exist without questions
without curiosity
without joining the crowd.

Rilke

Oh Rilke, how I wish I would

have sat next to you at my first writing workshop

You would have stopped the burning

in my gut.  Perhaps even offered me

a joint.  Unfortunately, I didn’t even know

who you were

until I sat in that class

where everyone looked bored

unimpressed

where dead poets were called out

declared madmen

to keep everyone

off-kilter

insecure

under control.