empire Archives

touring the empire

at midnight

There were forests and wildlands at the outskirts of the empire––still, can you imagine?! All quaking earth and quail whistle, where roaring waters sounded ceaselessly. We were paid to visit them, as translators––not very much, as everyone believed that none of the forms of this land had anything informative to offer. What they had to say was so much more than the intelligence the emperors were after but there wasn’t a word for what it was, so we returned without much to say, accepting pennies for our silence. We said nothing, too, of the stifling emptiness they built of gilded halls of recycled data sets, sharpened to cut the earnest pilgrim at every edge. The naked emperors bled, too, but no one spoke of this––neither the blood nor their nakedness. The dogs followed at a distance, to lick it up. There was no room in the shelters in the shadows of the golden halls, so we took our numbers and got in line with the others while the shining halls stood empty, dripping blood with the wind and the dogs howling through them.

Coffin of Light

Notes on shadows in time.

A white screen waits at the drive-in, illuminated promises unknown. Give me the absent past, someone whispers, and a stream of yesterdays flow in. A scene, the bodies in it, may be utterly artificial. Once photographed, they become real. To the tall silhouette waiting in the hallway, absent the rush: sing in praise of shadow in the empire of light.

***

Inspired by the photography of Hiroshi Sugimoto and also his Coffin of Light.

Flesh of the Empire

Listening in the wake of colonization by noise.

When they came for the silence of our sacred, the colonizers hid their weapons behind badges of efficiency. Speed! They said, by way of greeting, planting flags in the flesh of our flesh. Waking from sedation, we took them in, saying, Mine! rather than Out!

After that, movement meant aggravating wounds. A body learns to stay, shouting, Here I am! Forget the still, small voice. We thought at first of walking to one another with the stories we wove, but the invaders caught our song on the wind, and blocked that, too––for a time, anyway. Trespass of the mind became a punishable offense.

Consider concrete and a moving substance, how it alters the path. The shape of a river changes. You get wind tunnels. The dammed river becomes a reservoir, its former trajectory a wasteland. Then what?

The living will move. What this does to memory remains, as the saying goes, to be seen.

We looked and listened. Hands reached and bones breathed. There was a whisper beneath the gale, saying, Rise. No one was watching, and we heard.