“Homesick, my desire
Crawled across snow
Like smoke, for its lost fire”- Derek Walcott
My bed is in the south-west corner of a small room, walls to
the north and south, on the north wall resides a clock in the shape
of a compass’s wind rose, long hand on eight, short hand between
one and two, much closer to one. It closely mimics the clock that hung in
my parents’ living room for years when I was a child. A golden crown
of thorns nailed into the concrete to its left, a cabinet to store my
papers and books, lined with several paintings that my New Jersey
surrogate family sawed up and placed inside for reinforcement.
I have collected a lot of books, more than I can read in a lifetime it seems.
To the bookcase’s right a seven-foot mirror with the words “To Repel Ghosts”
written across its top edge in black sharpie scrawl, leans against the east
bookcase ascending up to the ceiling, plastic filing cabinets line the floor all
around it. Six film canisters are collecting dust. To the right of the clutter,
a small separator whose cloth oscillates between being bright white and moldy
yellow, is sectioned off into long rectangular sheets that offer privacy. It is
always pulled once I am sectioned off and in hiding.
Never pulled on a sunny morning, I lie in bed and watch the yellow spurts
creep over my body up into my eyes, my pupil and iris dancing in tune with the
brightness. The quality of light in New York is different, something about it
jarring, rough and erudite. The south wall has a bell screwed into the wall, its
brass exterior rusty after I left it covered in salt water and vinegar for a few
days last year when I started to conceptualize bringing “The Antilles” back to
life. To its right a decoration of the North Star and a bouquet of small dried
Calle lilies that were sent to me by my lover when I left. She thought I
abandoned her; it has taken a long time for us to come to any sort of
repair; we are finding a new language to communicate with, and to ease
the distance.
There are two photographs of mine that hang opposing each other;
one of a field, fake flowers, a plastic bag and glistening magic shoes.
It is black and white and blurry. I took it with a Holga in October 2008 in
northwestern New Jersey. The other photograph is a diptych of my lover
lying on our bed, her hand touching the plywood of her father’s house
that is split up the middle. The pillow that her hand is resting on is white.
The rest of her body is naked and shrouded in darkness, in the left section
her nipples face me. They resemble warriors.
The top of the room is lined with three strings of white Christmas
lights; I turn them on when I want the room to feel cozier, when I want to
feel less alone. To the west a red piece of cloth hangs from a golden rod
with leaves to one end, an emblem to a sort of forgiveness after reading
Genesis (the beginning) a multitude of times growing up. Two smaller
mirrors occupy the space and are littered with business and exhibition
cards. Looking at them now I realize that I wasn’t aware that I was/am so
attached the memorabilia of art.
I frequent the DIA/Electronic Arts Intermix building for Artist’s talks and
screenings of video works in their small stuffy room that is stocked with
too many chairs if you are flying solo through Chelsea. I always do. I like
the way my feet hit the concrete, and it is the only day once a month when I
really walk and listen to my body and my mind. For hours regardless of the
weather on Thursdays or Saturdays I find refuge within the sectioned corridor.
The collected memorabilia is housed around my mirrors. The disorder is stacked
between the glass and the frames; Weems, Anatsui, Trecartin, Ahwesh, Jonas,
Ruby, Lin, Wool, Cardiff, and Wonjnarowicz. The streets pass me, 22nd, 23rd,
24th, never past 27th, always above 17th, the small section that I feel akin to
I share with a multitude. The spaces in between the excuses and pardons,
openand closing doors, the Half King and crossing streets blindly. I find
stillness in 7000 oaks.
It is hard to think that four feet basalt stone columns stand out
amidst all the concrete, they don’t. In spring the trees that the
columns are paired with come into bloom; Linden, Gingko, Bradford Pear,
Sycamore, Honey Locust, Pine Oak, Red Oak, Elm, and Sycamore. One morning
between the budding leaves and reproductive systems I drifted into and out of
their lines, moving into and out of their passage and presence. The conscious
and social construction of 7000 oaks is how I look at the urban space of
New York when I flutter around and try to make order of the chaos and the
concrete. I liken the city to a macrocosm of that small space created by Joseph
Beuys, where I am allowed to drift into and out of the way, taking in the beauty
but understanding the form, content and its metaphysical relationship to the
urban, metropolitan and global.
Rebecca Solnit states, “Walking shares with making and working that
crucial element of engagement of the body and the mind with the world, of
knowing the world through the body and the body through the world...walking
is how the body measures itself against the earth, walking assuages or
legitimizes this alienation. All of my sparks and project ideas usually start when
I walk, when I explore old streets and give my mind time to shed its neuroses.
Blood vessels acting accordingly to shut out unwanted voices and fear, with my
body in motion, mental momentum stabilizes.
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