By AMA CODJOE
for Betty Shabazz
Who, when they killed her husband, was carrying
twin girls—not in her arms, but in an armless
sea, with bits of blood as food. She covered
“Portrait of a Man,” ca. 1470. Hans Memling (ca. 1430-1494). The Frick Collection.
Hans Memling, ca. 1470 (Frick Collection)
I know this man,
or feel I do,
or think I could—
as though his face
effaced the centuries
between us,
1.
Now, the Grundig in this dealer’s window screaming,
the silent oval speaker like a Munch,
and I hear it on a Sunday as I best recall:
By GAIL MAZUR
The flats mid-morning.
Fussy little house-hunting hermit crabs.
Razor clams, skate eggs, black mussels.
Sea glass frosted by the tides.
Fake alternative facts
Fake Big Brother, bisexual bystanders, blogs, boobs, bobos, blow-jobs, Born-Agains
Fake clowns, CCTV beheadings, chlamydia and climate change hysteria
Fake democratic doppelgangers, drive-by death squads, double-dead buffets
Fake emojis, ejaculating cows, ejected United passengers, erectile dysfunction do-it-yourself kits
Fake faux furs, fat-free, Fentanyl-induced full moons
The shadow tall and lean, inspired by a lighthouse, squints at the Merlion. My morning behavior skips breakfast just to tell my body to overcome the effects of the Merlion. People at the pet store are quitting their jobs only to watch the Merlion spurt water from its mouth like the tunnels of human love. The newly admitted patient who is seen from the open window waves at the Merlion. Clairvoyants finally predict a winner with the face of Singapura tattooed on the mythic scales of the Merlion. Lovers split, fully convinced about the Mertiger calling itself no more as the Merlion. Children down 10,000 bottles of Yakult so they can help the Merlion save this lion city and the sea overflowing with centillion neon. The televangelist reports about a new miracle and how it takes advantage of the daily shifts of the Merlion, spatial to temporal, particle to plexus. Accountants give celebrities free hugs, their palms are sweating, after taxing the civil case of the Merlion. But hold on there, youngster. What is the color of the Merlion? Does it speak a foreign language like Resilience? Does it roar, swim, walk aimlessly around the Central Business District? Will it quit water and start eating poetry? I know a place where it can go when it’s alone. Through its mouth, a tunnel: right where it starts it ends.
Ivy worries the dying tree. Robins
worry the grass, which is hardly grass
but an audience of violets mimicking
the sky. Mist worries the mountain,
a neckache of twisted pearls.
I still had a lover. Maybe let’s start there.
I hitched a ride to Boston, where I missed
the ferry by what seemed like minutes. But time
can work that way in the mind. I was in love
My friends were aware of the wish I nurtured.
If I had a daughter,
I would name her Srividya!
I was not influenced by any actor.
Our prayer room hosted a dazzling
crystal Sri Yantra on the holy altar.
By SASHA STILES
The Common is thrilled to welcome Sasha Stiles to our pages for the first time.
Table of Contents:
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
What does it mean to be human in a nearly posthuman era? How are the cornerstones of our universal condition—birth, breath, love, sex, faith, death—evolving in the context of biological and computational advances? How does it feel to be mostly flesh and blood in a world increasingly dominated by plastic and silicon, virtual presence and spectral signals? What dark corners of the future and of cyberspace can ancient wisdom illuminate? What does motherhood mean in a world of artificial wombs, lab-grown brains, self-replication, and the uncertain continuation of our species as we know it? Who are these robots, chatbots, androids, cyborgs and intelligences already walking and talking amongst us? Do our avatars make us, in some measure, immortal? TechnELEGY—the ongoing transmedia project and poetry collection from which these pieces are excerpted—is my attempt to grapple with these impossible questions.
—Sasha Stiles
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