A friend of mine has a typewriter in her apartment. When another
friend and I visited, they ended up having a conversation about
whiteness. And how around the mid century “white” became a boring
signifier, and how people in their position have this need to fill the
holes in their lives with other identities to find community and
purpose. And how hard it was to do that without cultural appropriation,
etc.
It was bleak, dear reader. A conversation of two madly
well-intentioned friends, both groping at a way to be a flowering human
being while adhering to this strange ethical code.
So I
thought about Robert Moses. And capitalism. And how some old men
dreamers decided to set up the suburbs, make Christmas a consumerist
idolatry, and tore asunder the old affirming bonds of community.
So I wrote this in one take while listening to their conversation:
(text edited a bit for clarity):
your bones are bleached white.
the calcium leaches out into the warm bath
– of driving to work
– of living in a studio
– of a high holiday dedicated to worshiping the god of veils around objects (Christmas!)
you can purchase some colour at the cost of your marrow.
coca-cola dissolves teeth.
we’ve all done that same experiment in school.
you think you are a canvass waiting to be painted.
I think you are a princess,
ill. the leeches draw away your blood,
balancing your humours.
the old wizards built delicate castles
in their minds. of leechcraft,
erring.
their imaginary constitutions will destroy yours.
there is inside you a dancing star.
kill the wizards. salt the leeches.
never apologize for being.
throw a prism on your light and become
the
R A I N B O W