for
I was born in order to be born, to contain
the steps of all that approaches,
of all that beats on my breast like a new trembling heart
-
Pablo Neruda
held
briefly
in
arms where the moist and trembling
quiet of memory
comes
unbound from the throb
of what cannot live
in
the space of a single life
- Mike Schertzer
|
The title of this work is Confluence.
Confluence means flowing together. Think of two rivers merging, intermingling.
Fluent means the ability to express oneself clearly.
Confluence... Speaking together. A conversation.
I
have never been to Andros, nor to Greece. As a foreigner I have
arrived on your shore. We speak different languages... but, is a
conversation possible?
It has been said that poetry is the natural language of the human
spirit. And so, I have used poetry, specifically, an imagined conversation
between the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda and myself, to express this
desire for speaking together...
Confluence: you and I, Greece and I, Andros and I.
I have used white chalk. It is a humble material. It is ephemeral...
like all of our efforts. And so we must be present and find value
in what is temporary. This is all we have.
Here, with this wall, I am not conversing with the past. I have
not written on the walls of a glorious ruin, but on concrete. I
am speaking with what lives and breathes today. No other conversation
is possible.
A river was here, now it is gone. And so I converse with what remains,
with what resists, with what sleeps and wakes in this river's bed.
I would like to thank Eva Bony and Christian Bony and all the artists
and collaborators of Epitopou 2019 (in particular Sofia Chrysafopoulou,
Roula Matar-Perret, Dmitri Tzikopoulos, and Effi Yannopoulou)...
and most of all, to you, the people of Andros, for welcoming me
and offering me the chance to dare this conversation, this confluence.
- M.S.
text in Greek (pdf)
(translated by Effi Yannopoulou)
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