Texts and paintings by Zavé Martohardjono, parts of a performance series and multimedia project, TERRITORY.
There is an island.
There are two sides of the island.
There is an island.
It was split in half,
Right down the middle.
White white white lines carved
In straight angles
By white white white hands.
On one side live all the brown people,
On one side live all the brown people,
On one side live all the brown people.
On the other side live
All the people who do not think they are brown anymore.
On both sides:
Same cheekbones
Same eyeballs
Same creaking knees
There is an island.
The island was split in half.
On one side: History as you know it.
On the other side…
The land speaks
Very clearly
But only some listen, only some
Speak back
The land speaks
They say everything we know to be true
Some of us deny the feeling in our bodies
Become sick
So so so thirsty, so hungry
In nations of food waste and starvation
Big pharma
And self-denial
The land sees all this
Their roots, vines, soil bursting fruit flowers gourds chemicals
And cries
Their wails
Sometimes crack the sky, thunder and hail and rain
Come down down down
Sometimes the heat of cosmic gases
Drive the land dry, mad
Crops wilt
Ocean churns up red Sargasso crisped black with death
What does the land say
When they are returned to themself
Returned to those who steward its health, livelihood
What does the land feel
When its many-footed, winged, slick-skinned creatures taste clean
Water, nourished air
When minerals glimmer in their phosphorescent bellies
How does the land sing
When acids dissipate
Mountains regrow firs, wide waxy banyans, lavender
And sage brush
When almost-disappeared bird songs echo again
Cacophonous,
So loud everyone shakes restless in the morning
What does life feel like back in the bones of a nearly-obliterated body
Some say
All grows back faster
Than the time it takes to
Be destroyed
Some say
The colors
Are more vivid than what you remember.
There is an island.
The island was split in half.
On one side, you know the story:
Colonizers come onto shore with their hungry eyes and white white white hands and sharp metal and viruses hidden in the folds of blankets they claim are gifts.
On one side, you know the story:
Successful revolutions breed new nations that become so burdened with IMF debt that hurricanes and tsunamis go unaided hundreds of years later. Millions left to wade filthy waters, drink lead. Floating bodies ignored by FEMA dot what used to be downtown streets.
On one side, you know the story:
Overproduced, oversized, over-harvested food. Piled high like mountains. But the fresh-picked only trickle up to the wealthiest, lightest skinned, most educated. Sold at seventeen times the growing price, displayed in small bundles on delicate wooden shelves inside warmly-lit glassy boutiques, wrapped carefully in recycled paper and twine for those who can afford. Those who move into the matching glass condos (where the Korean grocer used to be, and before that the West Indian market, and before that the yard where grandmothers grew summer tomatoes and squash). Now, through the glass, you see the hungry outnumber the full-bellied. Most are too proud to beg. And those who do have not eaten in time spans we all think unthinkable.
There is an island.
The island was split in half.
On one side, you know the story.
On the other side…
A story that has recurred thousands of times but has been redacted from textbooks, encyclopedias, school lesson plans.
On the other side…
A place where invading outsiders are found and killed before entry, both for the safety of the community and for that of the outsiders attempting to see in. Attempting to consume. Knowing the other side means witnessing, maybe even understanding freedom. And freedom is so dangerous that those who live it, make it are under constant threat of elimination.
On the other side…
The Protectors mask their faces for safety when inviting journalists and comrades in. When traveling for transnational organizing. The Protesters speak in undecipherable codes or create sign language to communicate across crowds. The Dancers hide the songs to preserve them so they cannot be erased, watered down, shredded apart.
There is an island.
An island that was split in half. You know much about one side of the island, but have you heard about the other?
Those walking along on the border trying to cross to the other half dream open-eyed questions during hazy, sleepless dawns.
Is the ocean water on that side blue-grey, teal, aqua? Pristine, protected, so clear it’s color changes every hour? Is it warm like the first day of Spring. Or does it, too, boil hot from the melting ice, burning Amazon.
Do fighter jets, militia, police helicopters cluster above? Do they wake to the heavy hum of machinery. Or do the Villagers spread smoking fires to mask their land from surveillance. Do they paint their faces neon to thwart recognition.
Newspapers write fantastical stories.
How long have the People been there. Did they get there by foot or floating wood or were they always there. Did the ocean sink to make them an unreachable hill. How many were they 10,000 years ago. Thousands enough to make and trade and build pyramids which now lie submerged under the thick of the jungle. Or were there just a few dancing at night in caves or air-carved cubbyholes scooped into mountainsides. Did they rise with the sun to pick fat berries and sweet sour fruits from the thick knotted vines.
Anthropologists speculate about the Sovereign, the Autonomous, those who must live in secret to stay alive. And scientists, hunched over humming screens fallen asleep sometimes wonder.
How do they love. Do they nestle to share heat against cool night breezes. What do they call that luscious feeling. When skin on skin becomes moist, slippery so that limbs tangle together effortlessly. That delicious rush of sensation before exhaustion overcomes.
Are their days long or short. Or lived in long chunks so that mornings, afternoons, night times, and twilights are each a day on its own. Do they count years, hours, months. What cycles of their body are honored as time. Does blood mark a season. What do they call that unexpected spurt that makes a child into a lover. The shrinking of an elder’s bones back to her baby size.
What sounds do their languages hold. Clicks and coos and drawls. Soft husky bristles like paper against paper. Dark moans. High tones that emanate like piercing sunlight from their eyes and crowns. Do they speak the same languages. How many.
Do you wonder?
Who is called when misunderstandings, misused words fly about between everybody. Does a circle form to repair what is tattered in conflict. Do elders gather and redirect misfortune or pass along their knowing. Are family members asked to walk the forest alone until they can hear their own wisdom again.
Are children cared for communally. And the dying held into their last breaths.
How does their despair feel. What about their delight. Birth, death, and the long stretch of aliveness between. How does their sourness, sweetness taste. What colors do they see.
