{ʇɥǝɹǝsɐ ɯɐƃɐɹıo ʇɯ}
Pierogi gallery in NYC is fundraising for Swing Left and I’m participating this year with it’s Power Ts! Because I too am a power T.
Choose from an interesting array of images that have been submitted to be printed on a Tote, T-shirt or mask. The amount you pay for the item you select goes toward inching the US out this, uh, how shall we put it, incredibly embarrassing time it’s been having.
I was invited to a cook out on Wednesday- yesterday at a little ranch up the road.
I social distanced in the shade of actual trees with other humans, sheep, goats, horses, a mismatched pack of dogs, chickens, turkeys, peacocks… I really wasn’t expecting this kind of place just off the main road, but there it was.
A lively young woman told this story in rapid, giddy Spanish that struck me square in the Absurd.
The story was about this cup of coffee that just would not taste right.
The woman had made her coffee and was dressing it up with her usual amount of sugar. She drank some, but it tasted wrong; still bitter. So she added more sugar. Tried it again. The coffee was still not to her liking, so she kept trying to make it taste better. She only gave up when another family member came and explained the reason for the coffee’s bad taste. She had not been adding sugar after all! It had been powdered snake! She had drunk at least a third of her coffee with polvo de la vibora!
Now, why would this God fearing family have such an item in the house to begin with? I didn’t ask. I didn’t need to. Given that I was on a ranch in Mexico, I knew that the people here would probably retain some folk medicine traditions. (Powdered snake is an unproven cancer treatment.)
Having grown up in the Northeastern USA, I don’t think very many people in that region would even consider having snake powder in their kitchens; not labeled clearly enough to not be mistaken for sugar.
I laughed. The story would make a good bit in a comedy sketch.
June 14th would have been Ko Murobushi‘s birthday. June 18th will be the 5th anniversary of his death.
He was one of my butoh teachers.
Last year I wrote some words for his birthday, but did not publish them at that time. I reworked them now into something better than before; maybe. The words are not adequate, but there they are.
Going through my old papers, I found a loose sheet in a notebook with a poem composed by Ko-san. It was typed in imperfect English so I gave the text some light editing in a way that made sense to me.
Does the dead mind such things?
Does the living?
I can’t tell any more.
If you are wondering, the poems do not go together. They are not in dialogue with one another. They just exist in proximity to one another on this page. Like I existed in proximity to Ko-san in New York.
If you are wondering, the poems do not go together. They are not in dialogue with one another. They just exist in proximity to one another on this page. Like I existed in proximity to Ko-san in New York.
| shared kyphosis i think of you from just two letters k o small-larger than life in the studio, on the stage human languages failing those in-breathing screeches how drunk were you you threw yourself onto the floor in a fit of lean, wondering muscle sinuous, tau(gh)t teaching i was a terrible student (still am) full of ghosts all eyes watering from cigarette smoke (and grief) a hopeless body i break in all the places you maybe never imagine existed most pathetic (more empathic) a tarnished silver i’ll not shine that bright ever too long, ever so clumsy a flabby shadow matched only at the back in shared kyphosis –tm– | trying to die, i started to dance. so today is the day i will meet the tiger. i can’t help it if he eats me- even- i don’t mind if he fucks me- we could also rend each other. i would jump into the empty sky then hanging with shreds of bitten flesh. the moment i throw my body, i grasp another form. there is no other way to stay alive. then it is as if my other self-double bears further other doubles. from the dying body diverse other selves that cannot be called but awkward are made, flutter then scatter. they are unevenly distributed, without a distinguishable border between any of them and as if they would disappear everywhere after catching the memory of the unknown. can we as limited process, as ephemeral life live an unlimited life? –ko murobushi– |
