Turning suddenly Bohemian, I wear a faded denim blouse, half-open at the throat and a long black skirt, over dark grey granny boots and thin stockings. Red, pouting lipstick and eyes lined darkly with glitter-gem powder and smooth dusky kohl. Hair, piled tightly in makeshift twists with two lacquered chopsticks. At the art exhibition, people step stones towards each other, reaching out with multi-striped scarves and silver earrings, saying that we are ourselves. The quick, smug embraces of fellow artists, the brief, brushing kisses welcoming, pushing out the rest of the brightly plastic world. I shrink into a screened corner feeling sick and heavy. Shouldn’t have come-- you think yourself one of us, what a charming, clever little girl!
I listen, and watch, the storyteller patronizing fear, and see. A young mother, red hair striped with pale gold, her slim fingers pulling her baby’s away from the silver ring in her nose. Two young men, their arms about each other’s waists, reading an artist’s biography in murmured endearments. Snatches of conversation--”I really like this one, can’t you feel, oh, not tonight, remember that one time?” They glory faintly in knowing this artist and that, saying that oh, isn’t it terrible/ her mother died of AIDS/ last year/ this series of photographs/the nakedness of grief.
It’s just poetry, I think, relieved somehow to have found empathy in the black-and-white blurs of truth. The shame of feeling so bourgeois softens, and I let my cousin pull me out to talk with his girlfriend. She pulls me into a welcoming hug, asking which of his photographs are my favorite. I could fall heir to this, I think, this quiet perfection.
I listen, and watch, the storyteller patronizing fear, and see. A young mother, red hair striped with pale gold, her slim fingers pulling her baby’s away from the silver ring in her nose. Two young men, their arms about each other’s waists, reading an artist’s biography in murmured endearments. Snatches of conversation--”I really like this one, can’t you feel, oh, not tonight, remember that one time?” They glory faintly in knowing this artist and that, saying that oh, isn’t it terrible/ her mother died of AIDS/ last year/ this series of photographs/the nakedness of grief.
It’s just poetry, I think, relieved somehow to have found empathy in the black-and-white blurs of truth. The shame of feeling so bourgeois softens, and I let my cousin pull me out to talk with his girlfriend. She pulls me into a welcoming hug, asking which of his photographs are my favorite. I could fall heir to this, I think, this quiet perfection.