#123: On pain, uncertainty and tenderness
Dear reader,
There is a deep sense of uncertainty that has settled into my days, and I sit quietly on my bed, watching the days turn to night, the weeks to months, waiting for this year to come to a close.
It gives me a sense of relief when someone else can articulate this feeling, as Richa Kaul Padte has in her takeover of This is my newsletter:
"I wonder if maybe all of us, in our own large and small ways, are discovering what it means to live with this sort of uncertainty on a daily basis. To not know what will happen — to our own bodies, to those of our loved ones, to the community body prevented from coming together. To have had the consequences of our small, daily actions rendered entirely unpredictable. To feel like time is coming undone, the possibilities for stitching it back together out of reach. Uncertainty feels like the pulse of 2020, its unstable beating heart."
There are things I must begin to accept, pains I must let go of and no reset button in sight to make any of it easier. But then I return to poetry and music, to art and literature, and a familiar feeling of gentleness comes flooding back. We must be tender with ourselves, I remind myself, and the pain begins to dissipate.
Here are four poems on pain that hit hard:
1. All Possible Pain by Brenda Shaughnessy
Feelings seem like made-up things,
though I know they’re not.
I don’t understand why they lead me
around, why I can’t explain to the cop
how the pot got in my car,
how my relationship
with god resembled that
of a prisoner and firing squad
and how I felt after I was shot.
Because then, the way I felt
was feelingless. I had no further
problems with authority.
I was free from the sharp
tongue of the boot of life,
from its scuffed leather toe.
My heart broken like a green bottle
in a parking lot. My life a parking lot,
ninety-eight degrees in the shade
but there is no shade,
never even a sliver.
What if all possible
pain was only the grief of truth?
The throb lingering
only in the exit wounds
though the entries were the ones
that couldn’t close. As if either of those
was the most real of an assortment
of realities—existing, documented,
hanging like the sentenced
under one sky’s roof.
But my feelings, well,
they had no such proof.
2. Grandmother by Valzhyna Mort
my grandmother
doesn’t know pain
she believes that
famine is nutrition
poverty is wealth
thirst is water
her body like a grapevine winding around a walking stick
her hair bees’ wings
she swallows the sun-speckles of pills
and calls the internet the telephone to america
her heart has turned into a rose the only thing you can do
is smell it
pressing yourself to her chest
there’s nothing else you can do with it
only a rose
her arms like stork’s legs
red sticks
and i am on my knees
howling like a wolf
at the white moon of your skull
grandmother
i’m telling you it’s not pain
just the embrace of a very strong god
one with an unshaven cheek that prickles when he kisses you.
3. Mindful Loitering by Michael Attie (excerpt)
I’m the lazy poet
who needs to fall in love
in order to write anything.
It’s a crazy world—
there’s too much beauty
or not enough.
Either way,
the pain seems inescapable.
4. Scream by Sandra Eliswa (from The Alipore Post journal)
A woman's voice can'tBe louder than the four walls - or so they say.
And so, we learned to scream
In alternative fashion:
We scream until the dough
Can't be folded anymore.
We scream the floors
Until they squeak.
We scream the laundry
So it smells of fabric conditioner
And sunshine.
We scream:
With our hands;
Our feet;
Our bodies.
And at night,
When we finally hit the bed
We drift off to sleep
To scream in our dreams.
Recommended Listening:
2. 2020 IS A SONG - A time capsule of music that got us through 2020. A wonderful initiative by writer and editor Marisa Aveling.
3. Sachal Studios' mesmerising rendition of Take Five for Dave Brubeck’s 100th Birthday
4. Lotta Love - Helado Negro ft. Flock Of Dimes (Neil Young cover)
5. Will I Know - Sea Oleena (found on gorilla vs bear's songs of 2020 playlist)
6. Last Sunbeams of Childhood - Andrew Wasylyk
Links of the Week:
1. Aesthetics of Windows (A Tumblr dedicated to windows in art)
2. A Love Letter to Tactile Hobbies + Screen-Free Career Goals
3.. "Even when I’m in my darkest places and it feels like a huge shadow is sitting on me, the shadow gets bored and decides to float away at some point. I used to think if I was doing serious work, I had to be serious all the time, when in fact the opposite is true. In order to do serious work, you have to make room for fun. At the end of the day, it’s your life and your life isn’t supposed to feel that heavy every single day."
-Chanel Miller on Slowing Down and Creating in Quarantine
4. I approve of a new Instagram account that features Looney Tunes Backgrounds. It's Nice That featured the curator Beñat Iturbe Hualde here.
5. The Art of Creativity | Taika Waititi
6. This website for Phoebe Bridger's label Saddest Factory Records is just so cool.
7. Peek Inside These Incredible Artist Homes: I love Georgia O’Keeffe's the most
8. Marina Abramović’s advice for healing: complain to a tree
9. A cohesive space for art, words and online newsletters - one of my last interviews this year, for Social Coffee
10. Lawrence Ferlinghetti reading his poem The world is a beautiful place.
This is my newsletter #19: Richa Kaul Padte
This week's takeover of the surprise newsletter is by Richa Kaul Padte, who talks about hope, living with uncertainty, reading and coping with a bad health year. She's a phenomenal writer, and captures the essence of life so beautifully, and with such bravery and vulnerability. There's also a list of some of her favourite books for the lovely folks at The Bookshop in Jor Bagh and collages from her existential 100 day project - 100forhirish.
I urge you to go read it for yourself here.
New on the journal:
1. A Non Person by Sweata Shukla
"I've always seen myself as 'nobody. For most of us, nobody means no one, but for me nobody embodies all forms of conscious and sub-conscious life forms in the universe. There's always an empty space inside us, which we want it to fulfill. You may see me, but what's inside of me is hollow. The hollow feeling which helps me to be more creative and keeps me motivated towards my creative pursuits."
-Sweata Shukla
2. Dearest Art Collector by Sharmee Shah (excerpt)
"I asked your male artist to paint me
brown, disproportionate and honest
or he’d be failing himself and his art,
for conforming to a definition of beauty
is disservice to Art itself.
And I ask you now dear art collector, with all your power and strength
why you choose to pelt our bodies
over our hearts and minds."
-Sharmee Shah
3. The Vocabulary of being by Kashvi Chandok (excerpt)
"i always thought that home was thick as a jam,
full of cantaloupe coloured marmalade staining my mouth
but its thin as riverwater, ready to fall into
the sea, seeping into me through the kitchen taps."
-Kashvi Chandok
Announcement: Listen to my first mix for boxout.fm this Saturday
Last month, New Delhi-based online radio station boxout.fm asked me to make a mix for their Chai & Chill section. I've spent many hours putting together my first ever mix, which goes perfectly with the gorgeous weather. It airs this Saturday from 2pm - 3pm IST on boxout.fm. Do check it out. I'll share the link to the mix in the next newsletter for those who miss out.
I leave you with this quote from The Little Prince, illustrated by Joanne
Wishing you all resilience and love,
Rohini
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