For years I’ve been obsessed with the word ‘contiguous.’ It means sharing a common border; touching. One of my favorite lines of poetry from Susan Maxwell’s Passenger goes: “no matter how early I wake I cannot find a posture contiguous with dawn/ I am the hole the wind forks around.” In his book Wet Land, Lucas de Lima writes, “I FEEL CONTIGUOUS WITH THE LANDSCAPE / LIKE ANY FLATTENED BIRD WHO SNEEZES BACK TO LIFE AFTER GETTING RUN / OVER BY A TRUCK.” Both uses of the word express an identification with/ an urge to merge with the land or sky. I’m obsessed with this sentiment. For me, it’s the biggest feeling of them all.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the intimacies and violences of borders/
How borders can be large and small — the boundaries we keep when it comes to our own skin and what it protects. Who do you share common borders with? How are these borders maintained and what shapes do they take?
The word contiguous also reminds me of what theorist Julia Kristeva writes in her essay Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection, translated by Leon S. Roudiez: “it lies there, quite close, but cannot be assimilated” (or annexed). The horror of the unknown interiorities of our neighbor. The frightening possibility that we could be harmed.
This newsletter is a thought experiment. A couple of things I find beautiful and stirring, and the sense I’m trying to make from them, interpolated with disposable film photos I’ve taken recently.
This past weekend the streets have been filled with protesters and revelers. Carnaval weekend coincides with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. I co-organized a party and also attended a protest. Both events were filled with moments of individual and collective grief, euphoria, and music.
The spirit of Carnaval is the feast, celebration, reckless abandon, and merriment before Lent. Personas, feathers, masks, and possibilities.
For me, this is one embodiment of the “city at night” feeling— a sensation that I have sought to language, which feels connected with the two uses of the word ‘contiguous’ and intertwined with encantamento. The city at nighttime feeling is one awash with possibilities. It’s walking through streets feeling vicariously illuminated by everything you pass by— whether that’s a couple kissing, clippings on a hairdresser’s floor, a tree growing at an awkward angle, graffiti that feels as though its written just for you.
In a fantastic article cowritten by Carlotta Trippa and Naiara Yumiko, encantamento is described as a “sensation that takes you out of the present time and space, while you become one with the plurality and material reality of nature.”
They go on to quote Luiz Antonio Simas and Luiz Rufino from the book Encantamento: sobre política de vida in saying that this is “a drive that tears the human being apart to transform it into an animal, the wind, a water body, a river rock and a grain of sand. [It] pluralizes the being, decentralizes it to showcase that it will never be total, but ecological and unfinished.”
The city at night feeling. Our urge to merge. I want to be ecological and unfinished. I don’t want to fit cleanly within the confines of a nation-state. I want to be soft, feral, and ungovernable.
I feel overwhelmed by the unending war racketeering that is the U.S. economy. The multilevel marketing scheme of conflict. Could we maybe… stop? Like what if we just… didn’t.
Empire refuses us our multiplicity and reinforces binary thinking.
Encantamento is one possible antidote to empire.
It’s important to be critical of where we focus our efforts and attention, and why. What is happening in Ukraine points to what has happened and is happening in so many other places. The consequences of imperialism are far-reaching. We need to stop saying these are unprecedented times. All times have a precedent.
As for my corner of the world, I believe in the cathartic power of nightlife, collective art-making, and poetry. Do you?
Songs for a city at night:
Writing updates:
I’ve had a poem published in Portland Review online. Read it here!
On March 20th, listen to me read from my forthcoming book along with some amazing writers from Perennial Press and Party Trick Press. It’s free! Register here.
On March 27th I will facilitate a workshop on writing and menstrual disorders with Remote Body. Check out their IG page for updates!
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As always, thank you for spending a part of your day with me, for thinking and feeling with me, for sharing your time and energy. This monthly newsletter will always be free. If you’d like to support my writing practice further, you can Venmo me (@duffylala) or subscribe to my paid tier. <3 <3 <3