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| Chine scroll painting |
To a Centaur on her Saturn Return
By Cory
Nakasue
Dear Saskia, I don’t have any answers for you. Just more
questions to add to your questions. After all what is a
Sagittarian
aside from innumerable questions and the risks they take in
search of answers
that only lead to more questions?
Half beast half
human. Unable to pick a form and wanting
to blend the best
of both worlds while rejecting the parts
that won’t fit
into Saturn’s unbendable
definitions
regarding what’s real.
Unfortunately, when Saturn returns
to the place in the sky
it occupied at your time of birth
it will make you choose:
Yes or no?
Woman or beast? Or maybe
you can convince the Lord
of Time to accept a centaur as a valuable member
of society.
*
I was in the city last weekend and thought of you.
I saw Quiet Days in Clichy,
the movie based on the Henry Miller book. By turns grotesque
and succulent. So hollow
that its potential for holding all the naked
boring beauty in the world
seemed palpable—mean and horrible
and so ugly it whips right back around and becomes gorgeous
again. And I wondered,
is there a story about two female companions
as raw and uncomplicated? Could we be
that story? A story that’s not
moralized, politicized, or sentimentalized—basically a
story that’s not romanticized.
Do I sound like Llyod Dobler in Say Anything?
So romantic
the way we imprison ourselves in frames
of reference.
So unlike yoga.
In Clichy, Joey and Carl structure their days
around immediate physical urges and epiphany
spasms amid a parade of distraction. Their days are one
long improvisational orgy performed with total commitment.
Theirs is an unapologetic launch
into NOW
and NOW and NOW
and NOW and
Now this is yoga.
It might not be EXACTLY what we teach
our students. I fantasize that the forms and philosophies
we so painstakingly convey are received
as the mere training wheels
they’re meant to be; little crutches
to get people to recognize an
AUTOMATIC-THOUGHT-FORM-PROGRAM-BRAIN-WASH
when they see it, cast it off and actually hear
their bodies revealing the mysteries of the universe like
the fucking arc of the covenant cracked open spewing shimmering golden light in
the form of rapturous knowledge.
As a Sagittarian, you might really appreciate that—crude
knowledge,
erupting in spite of the earth
getting off
on questions.
*
I don’t know Saskia.
Do you want to have a baby?
Should you have a baby?
Have you changed your mind about babies, motherhood,
womanhood and all that jazz? How does your body answer these questions?
Is your womb at war with your philosophy, your conscience,
your convenience? What
about romance?
Is it about that dude? His wants
making you question your wants? Or being haunted
by some shadow of “should” or “supposed to?”
You can’t cup your cunt with uncloven hooves—
catch the answers as they drop. Consult
yourself mid-gallop. The mud that gets kicked
up mid-motion is your product, your answer
your baby.
Run.
*
What about Thelma & Louise?
I like that story. These women
being rebellious. They
still get punished
in the romantic end; still martyrs
in reaction/resistance. They are running
away. They are prey.
Through all of their adventures in self
defense, they are framed
as beautifully and romantically uncommon.
Some kind of exception.
Then they die.
Are they supposed to be
particularly heroic?
For having a survival instinct?
For having a threshold?
For being human?
Should they be
framed
as rebels for participating
in the dualistic romance
of vengeance
perpetuated by dude-culture?
What if Thelma & Louise didn’t have to escape
situations they didn’t want to be in in the first place?
HA! Sorry. My bad.
That would be like trying to escape the word
“patriarchy” while it’s embedded in the very sentence-making
I depend on
to tell you that the patriarchy doesn’t apply
to me. Let’s
forget about that question.
I think we can begin to bend
the sharp edges of a language that points
us away from ourselves—that has us looking
outward for rules and benchmarks, that has us buying
into ideas like “normal” “natural” “the majority” and
“mainstream” vs. an “alternative.”
That there are only two choices to pick from
is one big lie. We can’t count
all the ways to be
ecstatically and responsibly free.
*
Clichy feels more female than Thelma & Louise…which is
weird.
These two dudes, cocks out
like weather vanes--divining rods pointing
them to FEELINGandFEELINGand FEELINGandFEELINGandFEELING
fucking anything in sight, lost
in a swirl of confusion and emotion where
every action is good-AND-bad, potent-AND-flaccid, innocent-AND-violent.
So sweetly
feminine. A glorious mess. Embodied and reflected upon.
Saskia, could we be that story? Or
is shape-shifting between forms
reserved
for those of privilege?
Can anyone really make their own
meaning?
Is rebellion the only tool
within reach
for some?
Rebellion feels like an answer
to someone else’s questions.
Answers are born
with limits.
Questions create the world
the answer lives in. If we’re truly
our own authorities, WE would build the house
our world lives in.
Rebellion feels like a reaction to those
shadow “shoulds” and “supposed to-s.” What if
we didn’t recognize those
words? What if
they were neutral? Like “paper”
and “vowel.” What if
“baby”
were as neutral as “towel”—as banal as vanilla, as vanilla
as oatmeal?
What if
the “shoulds” and “supposed to-s” just didn’t occur to us
as anything that applies to us?
I don’t want to tell you
how to feel about rebellion.
You don’t need me
to tell you WHAT
you already know. You don’t need me
to tell you THAT
you already know. You know that
every freak-out is a rejection
of NOW and that every hiccup in our certainty is a lapse
of trust in our body. You know. Every Sagittarian knows
that answers serve questions.
Can you can be the question?
