Shout for life

Point de vue

La mer

Esplanade de la Défense, Paris, 2011. Header of this blog, from it’s creation until January 2013.

Two months before I took that picture, someone talked to me there, at that very place where I later took the picture.

That was June 21st, Fête de la musique.
A moment before he came to me, I’d heard him sing with a rock band.

Among thousands of individuals in a colony, penguins identify their partner by the sound of their singing.

I thought I had recognized him.

In his voice was a shout for life.
The very same kind of shout I had in my voice: a muzzled shout.
From that moment, I knew we could mutually free ourselves of that muzzling. So I thought the two of us had to be. Forever.

No matter how much I hated La Defense. I always felt it was a hugely unhuman place. Giant towers there feel so much like the gigantic constructions ancient totalitarian system built at human costs – from egyptian pyramids to stalinian palaces. Their inner asceptical athmosphere and their outer oppressing size are so symbolic of how financial capitalism is squeezing life as well as human subjectivity.

When I went back to that place, I liked it though. Not just because he lived nearby and had showed me those cats that seem to come out of nowhere, after all the stressed out penguins in business suit, finally get on their two hours trip back to their suburbian house.

It felt like I was born there. I liked it, as you like the place where you are born. No matter how ugly or crazy the place is, you are attached to it. You can sometimes hate it. But you are still attached to it in some way. All you can choose is : attached in what way.

A year later, when I started this blog, I realized that maybe, I actually liked the place because something blossomed there. In what started there. In saying his name, in the soft caress of his arms. Something blossomed in my voice.

When we were sitting there chating, the water in front of us and the noise of some wonky air con blower as a wind ersatz got both of us to think of seaside. That was far from enough for me to call that place la mer.

And I wanted him with me on the road away from la mère, out of the Sagrada Familia wall. I wanted him so much. Probably because I thought I could not make that journey by myself.

It turned out that all he wanted was someone on his coach when he gets back from work or when he watches football games. No matter how much I loved him, at some point I had to face the facts : this is not me.

That’s how I learned that the road away from la mère, out of the sagrada familia wall is each of us own way.

Still. I fooled myself into believing he would come with me the whole way.
It took me a while to accept that no mater how much I loved him, I could only let him go his own way.
And take my own steps.

Poser ma voie.

Now that he holds someone else in his arms, that thing in my voice, that other myself that was born there grew stronger.

Poser ma voix.

That voice is rooted in the moments of tenderness with him. In that stretch of road we walked together, away from la mère.

I will take care of that seed.
Water it with more love
and let it grow.

To keep that voice blowing.

Dans le mur de la Sagrada Familia

Image

dans le mur de la Sagrada Familia

autoportrait à Barcelone, Basilique de la Sagrada Familia, juin 2002

Initialement publié sur un ancien site web présentant mes travaux d’enseignement et de recherche, l’autoportrait était alors caché derrière un clic sur mon nom affiché en titre de la page.

Sirènes

Parole

*

l’engourdissement guette
j’entends les sirènes
elles appellent vers l’abime

j’entends les sirènes
l’alerte est donnée
elles disent vers où ne pas aller

pour rejoindre la rive
pour rejoindre la vie

nager
l’eau est glacée
nager
je suis fatiguée
nager
je ne veux plus y aller
nager

il y aura d’autres regards, d’autres baisers,
il y aura d’autres bras, d’autres mains,
il y aura d’autres voix, d’autres mots

l’hiver ne dure pas toujours

Looking ahead
* A propos de sirène: soit dit en passant que l’histoire de celle qui échange sa queue de poisson contre des jambes, pour plaire à l’homme qu’elle aime, et meurt parce qu’il en aime une autre est bien le discours le plus crétin – pour ne pas dire criminel – qu’on puisse proposer aux petites filles pour leur dire quelque chose de l’amour !
Que peut-on bien faire d’une telle histoire, sinon penser qu’il ne faut pas hésiter à se changer au point de se mutiler pour plaire à celui qu’on aime et qu’aimer sans être aimé de même en retour est passible de mort ?? 2 fév. 2013
Heureusement, il y a eu des mises à jour pour cette histoire.25 fév. 2013

Respirer le vent du désir et vivre les tempêtes de la liberté, mais sortir couverte

Parole

Photo VG du tableau de Miss.Tic (2012) « Dans mes jardins secrets, le doux se crée » , 92 x 73cm, encre aérosol sur soie.
Photo VG du tableau de Miss.Tic (2012) « Dans mes jardins secrets, le doux se crée » , 92 x 73cm, encre aérosol sur soie,
prise à la Galerie Lelia Mordoch (75006 Paris) en juillet 2012 et publiée avec l’accord de Miss.Tic

« Dans mes jardins secrets, le doux se crée »
Sur le divan, ce dit se vit,
Sans le divan, ce dit se vend.
Mais pourquoi le dire sans vêtements ?