Momentum 9

On Saturday, as I described (and provided a picture of), I went to the ICA and saw an exhibit that really stuck with me -- Momentum 9: Kader Attia.

It has stuck with me through today. I thought of those ghosts all day today.

Momentum 9

In the dark dormitory designed

With plywood in mind and bare

Bulbs, I can feel the ghosts. They

Are the withered walking dead

Tired. Their mattresses cling

To their shapes like the wild

Mother to stillborn baby-in-arms.

She could die if she doesn’t let it go.

Or we could be the ghosts.

Strolling through their lives,

Their impressions neatly

Pressed into their mattress

As they hide under the frame

And try not to breath.

They could die if they don’t let it go.

In the end, when I leave the room

Breathing again. I am holding

A wall. A railing. Anything

To make the earth still again

And rotate back to now. Tangled

In extension cords, I feel tethered:

I could die if I don’t let it all go.

This is still, but it is a propeller

In the world of museums and art,

Chopping bits of past and making

You taste them, the dust of their

Weary years gone by.

Most of us

Choked. Most of us

Lived. Except those

Who could not

swallow. Except those

Who couldn’t let it go. They could.

Have. If. Did.