Crazy Crunchy Vessels
Robin Bailey #37.1
You are sitting at a table
feet firmly planted on
the grave of the
Mother Pioneer
amidst a million happy faces
wondering why you aren’t
working this event.
You should be out of your
chair, camera-in-hand,
hunched over, squinting,
browbeat by sun, sweat,
observing this scene which
you should not take part in
because you are objective:
That is, you are the objectified;
you are the real starving artist
you are the one on the edge of
all struggle, all liberation, all love
because you are not here to be
part of it. You are not here to be
one of them.
They want you there because you
have made yourself of use, insofar
that you keep to the sideline, that
you watch your step and your mouth,
that you bridge the gap between two
frayed glorified friend groups, that you
make & produce something incredible
and push its deadline indefinitely to
make room for the
“more important work.”
(Being there, for them).
This deadline is not just
your newspaper.
It is you,
living your life.
You are on hiatus, yes, at the whims
of every media-illiterate around you,
no matter how many pain-staking
seconds or minutes or hours you
attempt skillsharing. But also you
are this saint at the mercy
of an infinitely fallible
group / circle / party
that does not, did not
want you here.
And in a year you’ve thought
you spent proving your worth,
you’ve instead, more or less,
wasted it
proving this point:
They cannot love you
in a way that matters more
than you loving yourself.
“Smoking makes your heart pure” by Alex(a) Cruz-Abarca