CARVED VOICES
INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE CELEBRATING CREATIVE RESISTANCE
CARVED VOICES Issue 2 December 2016 Founder Sonali Mohapatra about.me/shineshons Co-Founder: Shantashree Mohanty about.me/shantashreemohanty EDITORS: Sonali Mohapatra Shantashree Mohanty Jess Dyson-Houghton Guest Editor for this Issue: Debanjan Basu Featured Cover Art Title: Fjörgyn Featured Cover Art By Resident Artist: Jess Dyson-Houghton Instagram: Instagram.com/jessquinnart © Copyright 2015 under CC BY-NC-ND license Website: https://medium.com/carved-voices facebook: https://www.facebook.com/carvedvoices/ twitter: @CarvedV instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carvedvoices/
CARVED VOICES
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CARVED VOICES
i. Editorial Conversation : Women who Envision
1. POETRY: The Contours of me by Sonali Mohapatra
3. SHORT ESSAY: SHAME: A Revolutionary emotion by Shantashree Mohanty 6. POETRY: QUEER by Anahita Sarabhai 14. ART WORK: Narcissus in Denial by Djuna Lize Croon 16. POETRY: A woman's sanity is a freaky thing by Shantashree Mohanty 18. SNIPPET: Building myself for the male gaze by Sonali Mohapatra
Project Nós Por Todas: Exploring the Female Body as a confrontational Space. By Photographer Camilla Cavalcante
35. TRAVELOGUE: To be is to travel by Juhi Rajhans
30. SHORT STORY: Legal Aside on Abortion.
32. POETRY: The shape of my assent by Sonali Mohapatra
38. POETRY: To Love by Lisa Satpathy 40. ARTWORK: UNABASHED by Anchita Addhya 41. POETRY: Shadow of the sun by Anchita Addhya 42. SHORT MEMOIR: Oli Spleen by Oli Spleen 49. POETRY: Identity Riddles by Sailendra N Tripathi 51. ART WORK: Free Will by Debashis Saha
An Interview with Anahita Sarabhai: Founder of Queerabad.
52. POETRY: Nothing Said by Suzzane Smith
55. POETRY: Hands by Durga Prasad Panda
58. CARVED LETTERS: A Letter to Kevin Spacey by Jess Dyson-Houghton
54. ART WORK: Chokher Bali by Debopriyo Sarkar 57. ART WORK: Renascence by Sarah Jane Hood 60. POETRY: Beautiful be Damned by Sonali Mohapatra 62. SNIPPET: YAWP by Jo Bailey 65. CARVED LETTERS: A Letter to Amy Winehouse by Shantashree Mohanty 68. ART WORK: The horned Goddess by Jess Dyson-Houghton
"STANDING ALONE" by Oliver Spleen: An autobiographical childhood memoir
70. SHORT STORY: Fenetres by Jack Setford
Women Who Envision. In our present issue, we at Carved Voices have decided to go a bit more organic and instead of writing a wellthought out scripted editorial for you, we decided to showcase to you an honest conversation between our founders Sonali Mohapatra, a theoretical physicist and Shantashree Mohanty, a lawyer, whose common love for poetry and common hunger for social change led to Carved Voices.
CARVED VOICES |
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The Editorial Conversation. Shantashree: Remember we tried to write a poem together when we were really little? Sonali: Dude, we wrote a book together when we were 7. Wait, it was feminist wasn’t it? Something about Barbie and beauty pageants and stuff! :O Haha, we were weird 7 year olds! I am sure that book is somewhere at home, it would be fun to look at it again, no? Shantashree : Exactly! i think your Uncle sending you Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was a big deal, sort of a turning point for us. Our reading habits grew after that. Sonali: Haha, yeah, my Ginny :* :* ;) Shantashree : OMG, do you remember that poem Ginny wrote for harry when she started crushing on him? His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad… Sonali: Gosh, i know, i thought it great at the time :P Sune, we should get on the second issue no? Some people i met told me that the first issue looked great, it looked very professional. Shantashree : Ya? i think we should. It's been crazy at work for both of us these past couple of months. But we should get back to it ASAP. By the way, tu gote poem lekhithilu Ginny paeen…and dedicated it to me. i'm trying to recall it.. Sonali: oh? Mane paka!! Sonali: In the meantime, eita dekhe, was writing this now:
Sometimes, when the sky turns grey and dark, I rejoice maybe the darkness will cloak me Sometime when it goes dark at 3 pm, I want to rejoice but I can’t and i feel all wrong like I want to smoothen down my edges till I fit in and I can rejoice at normal things without banging into them gracelessly, Once upon a time my father asked me why I wrote sad poems why could my words not be happy blissful, flying like a butterfly Yesterday my best friend told me I was like a butterfly flying around throughout college hard to pin down hard to find hard to own She said it like it was a good thing for me Little did people know that butterfly was banging around battering itself on the rusted metal of the cage trying to find attachment and with it, a way out. Sometimes, leaves look good to me, many kinds of leaves, for my mind is unexplored territory and I want to feel my emotions better in a safe space (If I ignore the world Imaginary becomes my reality) without having to explain and defend second guess things in turn things which I thought I had accepted with a finality long ago. I hear people joking about things
“innocent jokes”, jokes that pinch maybe they don’t realize that a joke always needs a subject to focus your attention on and criticize its every aspect till it finds itself funny. And so I learnt to laugh at families getting torn apart being humiliated being catcalled being laughed at being brown being sad being quiet being weird Having a broken family and and being curious like a cat. Sonali: I wish we were closer and more honest in school, in a way, we had parallel lives, very similar, but taboos kept us apart, i wish we talked more openly about how broken things were rather than laugh and pretend you know? Maybe we would have been stronger for it. Shantashree : I love this piece. It resonates so well. I keep losing my scribblings . And yeah just remembered. You wrote this: Her eyes are like roses that bloom Her face radiates like the full moon I wish she was mine She is really divine The happy maiden Of the Hogwarts dawn. Sonali: Oh God! That’s insane! Now i remember...Haha Shantashree: School was tough for me girl. I was just so confused and alienated. Half the time, i had no idea what was going on around me. We needed each other so much. I think i've failed you on many occasions. Not said somethings that i should have. You never ceased to inspire me though.
Sonali: Come on, all my school life, i spent accepting (which was hard) that you hated me :P Shantashree : That's not true! That's not true at all. Just that we were two little oddballs. We saw things differently. Sorta juxtaposed on our surroundings. I felt stupid and freakish. I wanted to fit it, made desperate attempts too, never worked out re… Felt like no one understood me. Bet you felt the same way. Sonali: Yep, i dunno, i went through oscillations, periods when i tried to fit in desperately and then periods when i just shrunk into myself. I guess i was known as a good listener and a “good girl” in school since i never said much because i did not feel like anyone would understand. I realized that conventional is accepted and i just thought i would do conventional better than anyone :P No wonder my parents were so surprised when i was suddenly very different and non-accepting and vocal in college :P I just finally started not giving a shit about being conventional you know? Shantashree : Good for you girl. Lucky you got outta here. I got stuck. Here and in my head. Like Leonard's mom said to Penny, the locus of my identity became exterior to me. It was all about how people perceived me. I was so lost. Suddenly i became completely self destructive up for quite sometime. I had these bouts of crying and locking myself up. Upset about something somebody said about me, or about my mistakes or the fact that i wasn't pursuing Literature. I missed you Yaar! Sonali: Me too! The times we stayed awake all night talking and working on the national science congress projects were some of the only times i have talked so honestly with someone till i was 18, I think. I think the way girls are many times pitted against each other is terrible. I call it the new patriarchy. Hahaha. Before, women did not have to (read "not allowed to") work or go out or do stuff and now, because we are out there, we are expected to be the best in everything, prove every single thing we do, prove to the society at every point we deserve this freedom “we” fought for. And all for what! What kind of a freedom is that? Sonali: Oh bdw, wanna see my outfit for today? :P Shantashree : Do i? Showmeeee Sonali: Raha. haha, i sneaked down to the washroom to take a couple of pics lol.
Lol, i look so funny! Sometimes, the washroom is the best place you can go to be truly yourself, maybe hide away for a bit, sit down for some retrospection :P Shantashree : I love it. You've gotten skinnier. My dark circles make me look old and diseased. Sonali: You! Look old and diseased! Lol. Never. Send me some selfies with those beautiful eyes. And i haven’t gotten skinnier, it’s just the dressing i think :P Shantashree : Should we call for submissions for the next issue? We have to come up with a theme first. Something more specific this time. Sonali: Yeah, i was thinking…. What about something related to our changing identities, varying identities, you know? They can be shaped by so many little things, countries, language, religion, sexuality, gender, conformity, nonconformity… dunno… the type of water we drink? Food, culture, Tv Shows, professions, body image! Friend circles, class, caste, community, exposure, dreams. What we say.. What we don’t say!! And it’s good to accept that it would keep evolving, growing, with ever changing contours or boundaries… … hmm? Shantashree : It's interesting you suggest that. I have to tell you how much I've been pondering upon this concept. You've heard of this show called Transparent on Amazon Prime right? I'm learning so much from it. We are so deeply trapped by the normative dictates of the binary, this whole ruckus about how one must be as opposed to what one truly is, is evil. Right? I'm in. Let's call this issue’s theme, THE CONTOURS OF IDENTITY. Sonali: I love it! The Contours of Identity it is! To be honest, i have never understood this ruckus about strict boundaries to everything. About binaries. I mean our hormones are a spectrum, what we are exposed to is a spectrum, the environment we interact with is a spectrum, our genetics are a huge spectrum, how can the end results be binaries, and why do people try so hard to fit themselves and others there. What is so great about binaries? (Oh well, boobs are good in twos i guess ;) and black-hole binaries give us great physics, but um, everything else is up for fluidity i would say :P ) Shantashree : Hahaha hell yeah. You are right identities can be about so many things. You know my mom is bengali right? And my Dad is odia? Yet i was never encouraged to acknowledge my bicultural identity. Of course I'm a proud odia but bengali culture is extremely rich and beautiful too… bengali language,
bengali food, bengali music! Hell the best filmmakers of our country are mostly bengali. There's this whole idea that your mother embraced your father's culture and his gotra and what not on the day of their marriage, and that's fine, but what happened to her own heritage? Must she be so ashamed of marrying outside of her caste and culture that she must deprive herself and her children to inherit its beauty? I only came to know my Mom’s parents are Chatterjees when i was about 11 or 12. Sonali: That late!! Woww! I mean i knew that your mom was bengali and i remember wondering why you did not speak bengali more or why you did not say more about it. Or why she didn’t, i mean i practically grew up in your's and Swagatika’s house! But so many things about family matters in all our families was so hush hush, every time i said something honest by chance, people used to look at me askance and I would go back to the safety of being a mute cute little good girl. Shantashree : Girl, it should be the whole point of Carved Voices, to dis-obligate people from holding back their true selves but in a realm of greater tolerance and love for one another! Sonali: Absolutely. Shantashree: Oyy, send me those pics you sent again na? Those were great, we will put them in a folder. And do you have mine? Those weird ones? Sonali: Here, they are!!
Contours Of Identity
Still from the movie Blue Valentine (2010) by Derek Cianfrance
The Contours of Me! By Sonali Mohapatra Sonali is a Jack of all trades and master of many: a theoretical physicist, poet, author, creative, dreamer, inspirational speaker all rolled into one who happened to found Carved Voices along with Shantashree Mohanty. In her spare time, she decorates, dances, cooks, talks and tries to photographs dreams.
My name was tomorrow dark haired in a sweaty t-shirt shooting looks at you from over there at the counter, deciding whether you actually thought like the book you were immersed in, whether mocha was how your thoughts tasted like or was it just your caffeine fix.
I was one, two, three up until hundred, a face upon all the counting sheep you would try to imagine to sweep your insomnia away under a deluge of will. I was your distraction and a constant, a barrage of counter-intuitive seriously important nonsense that made you feel blurry around your previously defined edges. I was poly, queer, atheist, agnostic, religious, spiritual, loyal, infidel all at once, blowing my mind, blowing yours, blowing both of us down into a well of deliciously addictive confusion, otherwise named “freedom” from our label-making brain. I was your outlaw, whom you needed to protect from the society but also, the bodyguard of your mind, reading letters to your memories which I found locked up in dark places but which deserved to frolic. I was your Stockholm Syndrome’s instance, locked in a beautiful dance with my cultural captors, in love with all the rings in the smoke that comes at the end of burning my lungs alive. I was maybe your dream and your nightmare juxtaposed, your
waking-to-check-she-is-still-there kind of girl, a rollercoaster, a big bang, a feminist, all rolled into one who made sense only when you kept looking into its hypnotic core/ and at other times gave you panic attacks like withdrawal symptoms from a life-supporting necessary-evil drug. I was your human, demons locked with the demons inside of you, playing hide and seek, trying to keep it intrigued, distracted, soothed, growling while you did the necessary to survive. . Name me once, name me twice, mould me as you want according to your will, I will react in ways, over days spent locked up with you inside your dreams, imaginations and memories. Playing with the lava inside your brain is the favorite pastime of the lava inside my brain, I will plant flowers that will survive the white-walkers in your blank space, when winter comes and you will have to face the world alone, I will always, always smile with you from the sunflowers inside your head.
Still from the 2012 film Perks of being a Wallflower
SHAME: A Revolutionary Emotion By Shantashree Mohanty
Shantashree lives in Bhubaneswar and works for the Indian Judiciary as a Civil Judge. She is a lover of words, sensibility and pleasant surprises. She co-founded Carved Voices with her dearest childhood friend Sonali Mohapatra.
So much of being a grown up, is about dealing with shame. And I think particularly for women, this whole issue of shame and the fear of ignominy, is deeply innate. I am saying all of this, while keeping my own shame as the epicentral emotion. After all, it is pervaded in my gut with almost a cold obstinacy that most definitely has had a great deal to do with shaping my persona. Recently, I heard Kathryn Hahn say somewhere, 'diary writing is generally more of female thing, especially at a very young age...this need to put her voice out there addressing some metaphorical being as Dear Diary, there's something so interesting and beautiful about that.' So, I’ve been reading my journals from when I was as little as may be 8 or 9 years old…if not anything else,
it seemed like perfect material to study the graph of my shame during the time I floundered through childhood and adolescence into adulthood. Shame is repressive and didactic. It degrades one to disease and death but at the same time, embeds in itself a subconscious desire to be seen, to have one’s voice heard, to be accepted and reclaim control of one's life. Being indoctrinated by religion, communal norms and political propaganda as to how we must be w.r.t our bodies, our opinions and dreams, we begin to accumulate more and more shame under our skins. Especially as women or people from other transsectional minorities, such as queer people or trans people in general, our view of self is contrived from the notions of being inadequate, inferior and ignorant. It feels somewhat appropriate to illustrate this struggle with a rather bleak yet relevant fact about myself. I have always used Razors to shave my arms and legs. I used them before ‘cuz I had no money, I do it now ‘cuz I'm lazy. The gruesome process of getting an appointment at a grooming place on a weekend only to have a bored professional declare war on your fleshentirely with a resting monster face… No way! So dealing with razors often means cutting myself accidentally and one time on purpose. I started shaving off my limbs only in my early twenties - simply so that I could wear a sleeveless dress or a top. But often I found people in my family or
relatives making a big deal out of this. ‘Good girls don't shave their body hair, only perverted sluts want such hair free glowy skin.’ Right on the other side of these opinions, mainstream popular culture and submissiveness to male gaze has always set unattainable standards of body image after which women must aspire to be perceived as desirable in any way. WHAT THEN? MORE SHAME. DIFFERENT SETS OF SHAME. CONFUSING SHAME...for the longest time, till I concluded that it must be solely a question of personal grooming and if anyone chooses to go natural about body hair, it should be completely cool. And I'd be lying if I said I haven't met guys with a similar opinion. I hate generalisation of patriarchal behaviour. Hell, one of the earliest relevant cries for feminism came from a man! In 1869, English philosopher, John Stuart Mill published an essay called The Subjection of Women with ideas he developed jointly with his wife Harriet Taylor Mill. In this essay he wrote extensively about equal opportunities and voting rights for women and worked towards it all his life. Salute to that. But the fact remains, that the tyranny of issues like slut-shaming, which has constantly whirled around me and many women I know, in it's poisonous
shadow… say for choice of clothes, failed relationships or simply being opinionated, are the harsh realities of life. Then there are the bigger issues like child abuse, gender discrimination, rape culture, harassment, cat-calling , abortion, domestic violence, criminalisation of homosexuality etc. etc., the shames ascribed thereto and their devastating consequences. In this letter that dates back to the year 1843-ish, Karl Marx writes to his friend Arnold Ruge, that SHAME IS A REVOLUTIONARY EMOTION. He says, 'the demand to abandon illusions about people's conditions is a demand to abandon the conditions which require illusions'. Isn't it time that we took it upon ourselves to topple down patriarchy and misogyny and hatefulness? Yeah sure, it's not all that easy. But let's talk about little things that we can do.We can confront people who think beautiful only means fair skin, shaved limbs, straight hair and slender waist;who patronise our demand for equal pay; who cut us off in the middle of expressing our opinions with their patriarchal exclamation marks; people who think homosexuality is an abomination; who discourage us from reporting sexual offences; who dismiss feminism as a fashion statement; who know nothing about our souls, our struggles or our compassion yet call us sluts and assault our dignity or say things like 'she was asking for it’. That we can do. Can't we? Because only then we can come together with all we’ve got and contribute better to the momentum
against bigger stuff like legal systems that don't have ONE STOP RAPE CRISIS CENTRES for sexual assault assistance or a society that doesn't let it’s girls to go to school or is responsible for unsafe abortions and doesn't pave way into creating abundant free clinics for planned parenthood. Let's keep talking about these things and make ‘em happen.
Still from the 2013 film La vie d'Adèle
QUEER by Anahita Sarabhai
My queer self has been mislabelled Miss taken for many things since birth She has been assumed Straight Away to be the same perfectly. Same.
My queer body has tried on every size has grown too far to fit any narrow mind Has been cloaked in lies woven into the very fabric of history, of your imaginations for me
My queer soul has raged screaming within the walls of my body A form inherited at birth. It has longed for escape Banging against the insides It has torn away at the fiction of my changing realities.
My queer tongue has spelt out words incorrectly for my self for my safety for your comfort. Has been held to not displace your sense of security. Your privilege.
My queer heart Has been broken Rebuilt Broken Rebuilt, endlessly by many hands In the search for a truth I am creating Every day, re inventing
My queer feet have danced in shoes placed before me that would not fit, could not be my own. Have tried to hide the scars of my journey that only begin there, curling upwards in embrace tracing each story over razor’s edge till the million blades of my hair.
My queer ness has become and is done with You
An Interview with Anahita Sarabhai Anahita Sarabhai has been a performing artist since the age of 6, and has performed extensively across Europe, North America, South Korea and within India. A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, NY, she is a dancer, actor, musician, teacher and poet. She currently teaches Theatre to IB students and runs workshops for corporate and NGO clients, focusing on team building, improvisation, confidence, creativity and imagination. Anahita is the Founder-Director of QueerAbad, Ahmedabad's only Queer-Ally safe space and online platform. Tell us something about QueerAbad and how it came into existence. What is its purpose? Do you have a story? Â Looking back, I think QueerAbad, or at least the seed of it, started as a concept, a hope, a need for community in my every day, which was severely lacking while I was growing up in Ahmedabad. Then a little over two years ago when I returned from living in a city like NYC and a university that is made up largely of queer students, that feeling became even more acute. Something I could no longer ignore and live without. That is when I felt the need to imagine and create this space. It took almost two years for me to feel prepared enough to take on the project and make it a reality. So it was only in June 2016 that, with a solid support system of a few queer friends, some allies and my partner that we finally began QueerAbad. The name of the group was something I had created and it had felt right in my head way before the group came into existence. The 'abad' is not only reflective of this city, though the group is city specific as of now, but equally importantly means a 'cultivated place' in it's original Persian roots. This felt really apt to my hopes of creating real spaces that felt safe and like our own. Our main goals are of two kinds, firstly on a more basic level we are working to create a safe (which is a large part of why it is primarily online), supportive and kind space for the queer community, their families and our allies. Secondly, we believe deeply in the importance of self education, discussion and intersectionality.
All of this plays out in a variety of ways including using the Facebook page to post about everything from the distinction of gender/sexuality to how to be a good ally, to where the legal aspects leave us to the rampant homophobia within the queer community. Apart from this, we have live events where queer artists showcase their work, poetry readings by the community themselves, monthly meetings to discuss just about anything etc. I have a favourite story I go back to every time I’'m unsure of the work we're doing and it's impact. It is from the very first event we ever held. It was an open mic poetry reading on a Sunday evening to which we were expecting only between 15 to 20 people (seeing as not many people even knew about us yet and Ahmedabadis can be lazy when it comes to actually leaving their homes to attend something!). As the evening kicked off and through the course of the next two hours we were dumbfounded and I’ll admit, ecstatic to see a persistent stream of people joining in. Our final head count ended up being over 100! If there was any indication we needed that the city was ready for something like this, we got it! Let's talk a little bit about your formative years. What was your childhood like? I had a very interesting childhood. Very different to say the least. Coming from the family I do, my life was public before I even realised it. However I was lucky enough to travel extensively, be exposed to various cultures and meet several artists from an early age. This played a huge role in imagining various possibilities and lives I would otherwise not have had access to. I also grew up surrounded by strong female role models, many of whom I got to call family, and all of whom were at the forefront of various social movements in India. Suffice to say I had an unconventional childhood! When did you first ponder upon your sexual orientation? Was it a difficult time? When did you come out to your family? Was it a tough decision? I actually didn't take much time to ponder at all, it was around the age of 10 or 11 that I consciously noticed that I was feeling something that was different than others, and then eventually during that time my curiosity and need to understand got the better of me and I managed to find a word (lesbian) that came even close to feeling relatable! Somewhere between then and 13, I remember making up my mind that this was something I was genuinely okay with and consciously deciding that I would never lie about who I was, to myself or to others, no matter what. Thinking of it now, I'm surprised that I had so much conviction even though I had sensed clearly even then, how much harder my life was going to become being who I was.
As for coming out, it was only when I had serious feelings for an older woman did I think it worth mentioning to my mother, while my father and I never really had a sit down about it! Different parts of my family have engaged with me about it when it has felt like the right time for them and they have been comfortable enough to talk to me about it. Having said that, the journey was neither linear nor easy. A local tabloid outed me at the age of 17, by which time luckily I had done most of my 'coming out', but still before I had been able to have a conversation about it with my maternal grandmother, with whom I was very close. This tabloid article was further circulated in four other major cities with a full size picture of me on the front page. That was more than any 17 year old should have to go through.
Thank you for sharing that with us, Anahita. Do you feel a sense of indignation towards the Indian Legal System for having failed the LGBTQ community? More than just that! My queer identity is one of many that I encompass and one of many that our legal system fails regularly. We’re huge fans of Amazon Prime’s recent groundbreaking show, Transparent. Can you tell us about some of your favourite queer literature or media? Alison Bechdel’s Fun-Home comes to mind straight away. I got to read it and watch the broadway show in NYC and absolutely loved both individually. Sadly I really didn't have a lot of books or movies where there was positive queer representation, and I suppose i'm still trying to make up for that!
Who would you say has been a defining part of your life? I don't really believe there has been one person to be quite honest. In fact the process has involved interactions and experiences shared with a variety of people. People that have often been influential have also been in equal parts disappointing, and it is recognising that that has made a difference. If you could give a message to other queer individuals out there, what would you say? Breathe. Pause. Don't be afraid in the face of the world's terror. Look in the mirror with your eyes closed. Listen harder. Harder still. It's okay to be confused, not have the answers, not know who you are, never just be one version of yourself, be constantly changing. Grow. Stand up taller everyday. Wake up ready to fight back. Take the time to cry, scream and laugh. Dance and sing to beautiful but also stupid music. Make stuff, and share it. What kind of boxes have you already freed yourself from, and what kind of boxes are you still struggling with? I'd like to think it really is an ongoing process that sometimes even involves breaking down the same boxes that seem to build back around you if you aren't paying attention!
I've managed to over the years work away from thinking of gender as a binary, including a continued questioning of what 'masculinity' or 'femininity' even mean and where I fall within those or how to challenge/allow myself the freedom to discover the shades in between. Though I will admit this is one of those things you can't really completely free yourself from, it’s always a conscious work in progress. The other big one would be the fact that distance, reflection and time has allowed me to identify the many boxes of my own privilege. While I can't claim to really have freed myself from them, since it's often not about one’s own choice at all, acknowledging and being conscious of them gives me the ability to keep myself in check and reassess how I interact with the world/people I interact with. I have also over the last few years found myself moving away from thinking of things as biological and therefore fixed. I think especially as a queer woman of colour (amongst other characteristics/identities that place me at the margins) this has been a crucial step in redefining and being able to form my own ideas of family, sexuality, home etc. I don't believe one can ever really fully escape many of these boxes but while occupying a queer body, it is also impossible to simple stay in one. Since gender, sexuality, sexual practices and ways of life are interlinked, it is a conscious negotiation. Therefore other norms such as marriage, monogamy or certain cultural practices produced by class hierarchies still remain spaces I struggle with. What, in your opinion, are some of the most powerful mediums that can push forward change in social perceptions? In my opinion, change in social perception has to be made at multiple levels simultaneously. On the one hand you desperately need mediums that reach the masses (tv/films/songs etc) to be creating content more responsibly and not perpetuating dangerous stereotypes. It should be understood that that only makes changing mindsets and behaviour in a positive direction harder. On the other hand, it is equally important for all the people who are working at the grass root level to continue reaching people in more concentrated ways. Today, social media is a third important medium where activism, debate, dissent and change (both positive and negative) are all taking place, which is why it is important we harness that too. We are very much at a time in the world (again) where we cannot ignore any aspect or medium.
Did you grow up with stories about your grandparents, and what do their legacies mean to you? How have they shaped you, and how has the journey of your mother: her being the famous dancer and change-maker she is, shaped your sensibilities? Coming from such an influential family, have you ever felt a sense of unfair expectation, or did your family nurture your passions? I was very lucky to have been partly brought up by my maternal grandmother, Amma. She was like the third parent in many ways, especially because my mother travelled so much (and I was the only granddaughter she had, so I got special attention!). As I slowly became older, I think I have learnt that while my brother and others in the family are like her in more discernible ways, I've gotten and been able to embody parts of her that are unseen but incredibly vital to the person she was. I have noticed and known things that no more than 2 or 3 other people know and have been able to put into words. But I like that I have become like her in those small special ways and that very few people see it. It's a little a secret I get to enjoy by myself! Sadly I didn't get a chance to really get to know my other three grandparents. My maternal grandfather, Vikram Dadaji, died very young, long before I was born. Though Amma (and many others with fond memories of him) did speak of him to me and I've been told over the years by her and my mother that he and I were similar in strange ways and would have gotten along incredibly well. More than the public persona and legacies themselves, it is these things that have stayed with me and always make me sad that I didn’t get a chance to know him. Having said that, I have managed to (or learnt to) not let the knowledge of their incredible work and contributions to this country overwhelm me. Cheesy as this may sound, I try instead to remember their commitment, dedication, humility and kindness, and channel those qualities into the person I am and the work I do.
Narcissus in Denial by Djuna Lize Croon
"I never start painting with a clear idea of the work I want to do in mind, but the product always features the female form. I think it is my way of confronting difficult ideas about body image that have floated in my mind since I had an eating disorder as a teenager, and celebrating the beauty of curves." - Djuna
A woman's sanity is a freaky thing. Isolated like a private pledge, stripped of shadows, hanging by a string A woman's sanity is a freaky thing. A woman's sanity is a shapeshifter scattered all over her bed as she fake smokes for hours deciding what to wear for a room full of snobs and the empty glare of bling A woman's sanity is a freaky thing. A woman's sanity lies in periodic sloughing of her womb; crushed under the tyranny of a red dragon taking over every fiber of her being A woman's sanity is a freaky thing.
A Woman's Sanity is a Freaky Thing. By Shantashree Mohanty
Must she put herself out there slithering and grinding, around the vitruvian arcades of a pleasure that’ll make her snivel until the demons in her breasts fall quiet, or must she, crumple down with the half read book in her sling A womans sanity is a freaky thing. A woman's sanity is a dream that has been made cold by terminal fatigue. Bearing it’s burden with grace; she stumbles through failure stewing in a pool of names that sting. A woman's sanity is a freaky thing. How can a woman's sanity compose itself when questioned for choosing to shave or not shave her body or raising a child without a ring? How indeed, when she's been told all her life that her true charm is in being overpowered by her king? What use does she have for stigma when this world doesn't want its women to fly so it clips off that little baby wing! A woman's sanity is a freaky thing. Still from the 2013 movie Ida
Building Myself for the Male Gaze! By Sonali Mohapatra
Recently I found an article in the New Yorker which wrote “Berger wrote that a woman’s “own sense of being in herself is supplanted by a sense of being appreciated as herself by another” — namely, by a male viewer. Women, Berger argued, live in a state of self-consciousness that is at once artificial and authentic to the world we live in. He offers two images for comparison: the 1814 Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres painting “La Grande Odalisque”
and a photo from a nineteen-sixties girlie magazine. “Is not the expression remarkably similar in each case?” he asks. “It is the expression of a woman responding with calculated charm to the man whom she imagines looking at her — although she doesn’t know him.” It is an expression that Del Rey wears as she stares at the camera in those early videos. She controlled the process, unlike the women in those images; but, like them, she was “offering up her femininity as the surveyed,” as Berger put it. As tends to happen, she was both rewarded and punished for doing so.” This inevitably reminded me of the stop checks in my life, every little difference in my routine, every little confidence loss in my looks as well as the reverse. My resistance to how looks should be, how beauty is portrayed. For there would be no revolution without a pre-determined “thisis-perfect” standard. I never wanted to be a plastic doll with prefect hair and fair skin. And yet, I coveted to be them and since I did not have the means and the expertise to be them, I had to find something in which I was different and that which could be used to raise my candidature as a perfect female made for the male gaze and examination. That for me was my brain. My jokes, my behaviour, in my way I sat, in the way I sang, in the way I refused to adhere to norms. It was in the truest sense, a false rebellion. Mixed with some hint of the truth. When I was 10, I tied my breasts and tried to squash them down with the tightest sport bras i could find, I must not have a breast! I must not!
And when I was 19, I subconsciousintentionally gained weight to make my curves bigger, have better love handles and improve my undersized “lemon-like” breasts. At this point of my life,I stop to wonder, how much of the body and my looks that I have worked on have been for myself and how much has been for the world? Do I see myself as I am seen? Am I seen as I want to be seen? How did I create that self portrait of myself in my head? Is my self portrait a mirror of reality or is it a painting in my head to make myself believe I get rewarded by the male gaze? And if yes, when will I get out of the narratives that have determined me and start to work as if I am seeing things rather than being seen?
Nรณs Por Todas Introducing our featured photographer slash artist, "Camila Cavalcante". Camilla is a visual artist from the north-east coast of Brazil, currently settled in the UK. She holds a Masters of the Arts degree from University of Westminster and works for the London School of Photography. Camila was awarded two photography national prizes in her home country and has taken part in over 20 exhibitions and three art residencies in Brazil, the US, Mexico and the UK. Carved Voices caught up to Camilla to learn about her daring project "Nรณs Por Todas" exploring the contours of courage, sisterhood, feminism, law and photography.
Us for All (2011-2) “I left without knowing if I would ever return or how it would be. I was not able to tell anyone about it and hoped that no one would look for me in those days.” She believes that abortion should be considered a woman’s right today more than ever. Not just because she experienced it, but because she knows that there are many more anonymous women around.
Us for All (2011) "It is a woman's right. It is the expression of her autonomy to claim uncompromising power over her own body and destiny. It is the overcoming of motherhood as a biological destiny". She is used to talking to crowds about women's rights, but she can never talk about her own experience of the subject.
About.... Nós Por Todas, Portuguese for Us For All, is a project that explores the idea of the female body as a confrontational space. In Brazil, abortion is only legal to save the woman’s life, in case of a foetus without a brain and in cases of rape. The Lower House of Congress, however, has put forward an agenda that challenges abortion even in the few cases that it is currently legal. Despite this prohibition, recent research suggests that one in five women between 14 and 40 years old have had at least one abortion in their lives. These women risk their lives undergoing unregulated procedures with pseudo doctors and no psychological support. Within this context, For the last 20 months I have been developing a network of women in Brazil that joined the debate and shared with me their experiences and opinions about illegal abortion, with their identities protected. I have taken nude self-portraits holding and hugging these women in their homes, with their back to the camera, while I reveal my face, exposing my body and my identity in their name. The titles of the images refer to the year in which those women experienced an illegal abortion. Each image is followed by a quote from the conversations I had with each one of the collaborators as well as a personal observation about our encounter. The written word and the photographs, side by side, give voice to those women’s stories, creating a political and intimate manifesto. If you would like to know more about the project, please visit www.camilacavalcante.com/usforall
Us for All (1991) “I don’t know how to explain. I don’t feel ashamed, I don’t feel guilty. I feel that there is a gap, if I think of it in the spiritual sense. “ She asked for the support of her family and partner, but the only ones who helped her were a few friends. This experience showed her how illegal abortions put women in a position of physical and psychological vulnerability.
Us for All  (1999) "When the nurse looked at me, I felt all the weight and judgment a woman can experience for making this decision without the support of the law or public health." The resentment she feels against the handling of her experience in the hospital is very strong specially because it came from another woman.
Us for All  (2000) "A public debate is fundamental to end this hypocrisy." This is the main building of one of the largest universities in Brazil: Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
Us for All (2014) “The doctor looked at me with disapproval and disbelief. I was very anxious. She started to accuse me before she even examined me. When I laid on the hospital bed I was already weeping.” The three female doctors that dealt with her case were hypercritical and hostile, even when her life was clearly at serious risk. One of the doctors, with a crucifix as a necklace, actually threatened to report her.
Us for All (1998-2) “It’s such a common and generalised rhetoric... the one that associates abortion with irresponsibility, guilt, negligence, murder and crime. All this negativity always falls on the woman, as if it would be possible for her to become pregnant on her own.” She could not understand the fact that we live in a culture in which the most common contraceptive is for the man, but despite that, women are to be blamed when this contraceptive is not used. As if she carried an obligation to ‘close her legs’.
Us for All  (2015-2) “It is difficult to talk about this, but the worst part was not being able to tell anyone and expose myself; the guilt I felt for having lied. Nobody knows about it.� Her mother influenced her to be very religious in the past and she thinks that there will always be vestiges of that upbringing. However, today she knows that lying was essential to protect herself from the moral judgement from her family and society in general.
A Legal Aside. The World Health Organization defines 'unsafe abortion' as a procedure for terminating a pregnancy that is performed by an individual lacking the necessary skills, or in an environment that does not conform to minimal medical standards, or both. Unsafe abortions commonly occur in places where abortion is either illegal or stringently regulated by limitations of Law. Nearly half of all abortions worldwide are unsafe, and largely take place in developing countries. In countries where abortions remain unsafe, it is a leading cause of maternal mortality. According to recent research conducted by the World Health Organisation, 21.6 million women experience an unsafe abortion worldwide each year; 18.5 million of these occur in developing countries 47,000 women die from complications of unsafe abortion each year. Deaths due to unsafe abortion remain close to 13% of all maternal deaths. For better insight, here's some information on criminalisation of abortion in Brazil: The legality of the performance of abortion in Brazil is governed by the Brazilian Penal Code, dating from 1940. Under the Code, a physician may perform an abortion when it is the only means to save the life of the pregnant woman or when the pregnancy is the result of rape. In the latter case, the pregnant woman must consent or, if she is incompetent, her legal representative must consent. Illegal abortion in Brazil is punishable by one to three years of imprisonment for the person inducing the abortion; the penalty is higher if the pregnant woman’s consent is not obtained, if the woman suffers serious injury or dies, or if the woman is under 14 years of age. Despite this, it is estimated that around one million abortions are conducted illegally in Brazil each year. Complications from illegal abortions are the third leading cause of maternal deaths in Brazil. According to an article by Reuters published in May, 2016, Brazil's National Health System estimates that 250,000 women a year arrive in hospital emergency rooms with health problems that are a direct consequence of unsafe abortions. For better illustration, here's the current legal position in India: In India, abortion is regulated by the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971. Under the said Act, abortion is a qualified right.
As per Section 3(2), it can’t be performed based solely on a woman’s request. And it can only be performed by a registered medical practitioner before 12 weeks of pregnancy. In case the woman had been pregnant for more than 12 weeks – but for less than 20 weeks – the opinions of two medical practitioners are required. An abortion is permitted only if continuing the pregnancy poses a ‘substantial risk’ to the woman’s life or to her ‘physical or mental health’. Alternatively, if the child that is yet to be born faces similar substantial risk – in that it would suffer from ‘physical or mental abnormalities’ or may be ‘seriously handicapped’ – an abortion may be allowed. In case of pregnancies caused by rape, or a failure of birth control (for married women), the risk to their mental health is admissible grounds for abortion. There are so many regressive lacunas in this legislation. The reason why abortion can be permitted before 20 weeks is that, generally,abnormalities can be detected by that time. However, some rare congenital diseases can be detected only after 20 weeks which can be a fatal risk to both mother and child. Secondly, sexually active unmarried women are not protected under this act in case of pregnancy due to failure of contraception, but can only take recourse to the ground of mental injury, which again is a very subjective question. The MTP (Amendment) Bill 2014 has proposed to erradicate some of these problems like replacing ‘registered medical practitioners’ with ‘registered healthcare providers’.However no concrete steps have been taken so far. Above all, there is the issue of disdainful perception towards women opting for termination of pregnancy, especially when they are not married. As of result of social stigma these women opt for unsafe abortions. Due to lack of affordable reproductive health care centres like those established by 'Planned Parenthood Federation of America' in the United States and some other countries, women fail to deal with unwanted pregnancies effectively. Sex education is not a part of the curriculum in many many countries. Again, because of the very fact that an unmarried woman is sexually active, is frowned upon in certain countries, these young women find it extremely difficult to determine suitable methods of birth control. The problems are many but the solutions are rolling-in very very slowly. It's a big fight and men and women across the globe are coming forward to contribute to the cause. One such significant contribution is being made by artist Camila Cavalcante through her project Nós Por Todos Portuguese for 'Us for All' based in her home country Brazil. Carved Voices is honored to publish Camila's compelling work.
Still from Big Little Lies, 2017 (HBO)
I have always wondered, Why my “no” sounded like a “yes” that day. No. Nahin. Wait. Not interested! Kya kar rahe ho yaar!! Ugh! Where did all of these sounds go? Drifting off into silence in spite of my screaming them out? “Why did you come to london then?”, he asked. and I looked speechless at his impudence, at his assumption, What is so great about him, I wonder, that women should flock to london to sleep with him? I was speechless! With surprise that guys like him exist and I found myself with one.
The Shape of My Assent By Sonali Mohapatra
Because in our patriarchy ridden rape culture like societal prison molestation was a thing of everyday (read ^sad^) But downright rape!! Was a thing I did not know could happen to me (It was a thing I read in newspapers and was outraged by) and here I was, trying to sleep an innocent night away in my comfy pyjamas, which he will raise above my hands. And in my silence was born my assent to him. That little silence of speechlessness blanketed everything else: Nahin. Ruko. Wait. Ugh. Stop it! “You are so stubborn, yaar!”, he says, surprised, when I tried to push him away I see a glimmer of his crazed, lustful eyes and somehow got scared into not pushing and more reasoning him away. (Because sure you can reason with potential rapists that was what I had thought, till I learnt it the harder way.) He finds it funny and “teases” me: “kiss me or I will not give you your clothes again” “I really don’t care!”, I said, frustrated. And he was “astonished” that a girl could find confidence even in her nakedness!
"Nahin. No! Stop it! Back off dude!!", I say. And he says, “You like it rough, don’t you?” Girls like you, you like to be persuaded, moulded manipulated, “Haven’t you manipulated people before?”, he asks, “A girl like you, smart, beautiful, talented!”, “I am sure you have wrapped people around your little finger.” And I tell him, trying to be “patient” After all, he was a friend’s friend! “You know you are forcing yourself on me, right? ” And he laughs saying, “What? You mean rape? I have different priorities, I want to make you feel!” And thus was born my assent, from his need to make me feel taking precedence over my Nahin! No! Get off me!! I think, maybe, he will stop after just one kiss, and i l regret it forever, that one kiss which was meant to end the horrible turn of events! He swells up like a lion in blood lust kiss and kiss, trap me under his body weight starts thrusting, I watch with mounting horror perched on me now he doesn’t even have a condom tries to get my stuff down.
I feel the rage rising rising rising and I push him off, and watch with speechlessness eyes moulded permanently wide open as he holds me down and comes over my chest. Nahin, No, Get off me!
To be is to travel By: Juhi Rajhans
I have always wanted to maintain a travel journal. It was my father who introduced me to the joys of travel. My parents took me on several family vacations to North Bengal, Sikkim, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. I continued the tradition of travel, albeit unintentionally in my career as a physics scholar. Over the years, as a physicist-in-making, I traveled deep into the mountains and plateaus of India, the deserts of Qatar, the cultural divide of Turkey, the volcanic islands of Japan, the immortal city of Prague, the sleepy southern Italian cities, the glamorous city of Paris, the French countryside and the melting-pot of North-Eastern America. Thus, I suspect that, travel, for me, is the constant potter to the contours of my identity. I was born in a small suburban town in Jharkhand. As a result of industrialisation, my father and mother had to move to settle down in a town called Haldia.
Located on the shore of the river Haldi, it is a rapidly growing industrial hub a few miles away from the Bay of Bengal and on the tip of the Ganges delta. We traveled back and forth between Haldia and Dumarkunda (in Jharkhand) throughout the year all through my childhood. My parents wished for us to embrace our culture and to remember where home was. India is a country with an intense conflict of ideas, ideologies and culture.That became synonymous with home for me. In my mind however, I remained stuck at the bordering river between the two states. My twin hometowns were their own versions of Stars Hollow, small quaint towns where everyone knew everyone else. Festivals were an excuse to get together and celebrate, and every child’s triumphs and tribulations became a concern for the entire community. Like most Indian teenagers growing up during the turn of the 21st century, I grew up on writings of British writers like Oscar Wilde, the Blyton sisters, Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Austen and Robert Frost. Rowling’s Harry Potter was a huge influence on me. I waited madly for that acceptance letter to arrive and have traveled around the world looking for Hogwarts ever since. If the world today were Rowling’s life-size chess-board, a very dangerous shadow has just lurked in. Unlike Rowling’s boggart, this one can’t be easily confused. It may have the shape of a white blob of less-than-primate intelligence but it can rule the board merely by marginalizing any piece on the board.
It can scare a horse for being a horse, a pawn for being a pawn, a knight for being a knight, a minister for being a minister, a queen for being a queen or a king for being a king. If you are one of these warriors, my idea of a weapon would be those quaint town communities of my childhood, where love and respect was for free in exchange for a little monotony. Over the years I have found solace and security in such communities in different parts of the world. I feel self security is one of the many gifts from my travels around the world. I spent most of my early twenties in a small central Bengal village called Mohanpur. It has ethereal forests, beautiful rains, a superbly horrible transport system, insects and small wild animals. This village is located beside a major national highway, and one can drive past it in minutes. I sometimes wonder how my life would have turned out had I not stopped by for five years or so, and just driven by? Would I have ever met the simple people of rural Bengal or amazing frogs with bright orange patches on their back turn up at students’ doorsteps to offer daily greetings? How did this place mould me as a person? I think this tiny village made me curious about the world, expectant of new surprises and adventures. It opened me up to people.
I did write some passages in my travel journal. I had worried so much about keeping it safe that it has long since been lost. I do remember certain parts of it. Once while we were touring the North Bengal Doars, we had rented a house. My sister and I had bunked together in a tiny attic. I remember hearing pigeons on the roof all night. In the morning, as I watched the sun rise, I remember sitting in the woods writing in my journal - “It is a new year, the weather is nice,... and something about pigeons fighting. I really think a lot about pigeons. I can watch them for hours on end . I was recently in Italy, in a city called Bari. One afternoon, I reached the town square before the shops opened; so I watched pigeons fight for around two hours. “There is a trend to the things that go on in my mind every time my eyes zoom in on pigeons. Whenever I go to a new place and find pigeons sitting on a barbed wire or on a roof, I feel as though I have unlocked some major level of a mystery. At my grandparents place, when I used to watch pigeons pick on the grains when I was still a child, I wondered if they knew that I was a part of their world. When I thought about the pigeons on my roof in Bengal Doars, I wondered if they knew where I fitted in during my college life. As I watched pigeons during my trip to Manali after my graduation, I wondered if they knew where I am supposed to be headed after college, because I truly had no idea. And on that lazy afternoon in Italy, I wondered if the pigeons fighting in front of me had any clue as to how I got there.” I visited a mountain-lake at the border of Austria and Germany last summer. The ferry routinely stops mid-route and a musician plays a folk song on a trumpet. It is truly a wonder when the mountains sing back to you in echoes! While in Italy, having never spoken a word of Italian, I managed to have chats with people on bus-stops, pizzerias and sea-side villages. I could even argue with them in Italian
since they have a very similar body language to Indians. It was as though I always knew them - I had passed through their reflections and shadows so many times in my tiny life that they were already a part of me before I actually met them. I have learnt that reflections of pieces of me are all over the world and small pieces of the world make me. The contours of our identities, in my observation, are constantly tugged at and morphed by the world around us. As way leads on to way for a traveller in this ever-changing world, our identities move with us like shadows, sometimes shrinking into the size of tiny tennis balls and sometimes expanding far beyond our bodies. In summary, whenever I have been presented with opportunities and crossroads in life, I look for pigeons. Because they have been around a lot and they seem to know what’s going on.
To Love
By Lisa Satpathy She was afraid to love I think it scared her. She liked things that were concrete, like the ocean. Something you could point to on a map know what it was. I think that’s why she always hid She couldn’t touch it. hold it make sure it never changed.
He spoke Touching me “These tired quiet eyes See all And shine to hide a wild wicked mind.” Then he smiled Fuck, sweet and swell “You’re like the ocean…” He mused “Pretty more on the surface, but dive down into your deep dream depth, you’ll find beauty most people never gleam. Lucky me. I fell into your eyes.” Today I will write about us, it will hurt but it will break the sore of what we were once more.
Unabashed Anchita Addhya
Shadow of the Sun. By Anchita Addhya The words burst in my head, words I thought I buried deep down Voices, poison-blue, screaming who I should be, They bought me a mirror, peeled my skin till I could no longer feel, The throbbing pain, the pungent smell of the dying soul in me. They pulled open my eyes, I screamed in agony, spat at their faces My wounds were too deep, from the unwanted deluge of their praise. My mirror only stares, a smile not mine to possess, a voice not mine to own. As my reality is slowly drowned, fading into a purple haze. Suddenly I was back in my home, locked up in my hell-hole, into my domain of existence. A flurry of conversations, they told me I was too young to understand. The screams of my mother from the other bedroom, a puddle of blood; My dad asks me to be silent, be his nice little girl. That night, I ran. I ran as far my little legs took me, I thought I escaped my demons. Twenty later I still run from myself, throw myself on the shards of freedom. I still shiver when people ask “Who are you?”, my nails scathe my palm With clenched fists and sunset smiles, I say “I am the shadow of the Sun”. They laugh, I laugh along; they see the concealed wounds, shaded with crayons They smell the cigarettes, mixed with the perfumes of a blooming rhododendron. I strip my masks, one by one, dump them in the trash, on my way back home, I scrub my chest, claw at the edges, till my heart spurts out blood; I leave the shower on. I step out the next day, a new name, new lies, a fake smile adorning my face, “You look so pretty”, they say,” You should smile more”, their lecherous gaze on me, They see a body wrapped over a soul, I could never call my own. My muscles twitch in pain; I scream silently, I feel like a whore. But I was doing fine, rewriting my existence by the day, lurking in the shadows; Till my lips slipped the address of my mind, like a prayer escaped on a lonely day. Now they come back every day and tell me I am crazy and who I should be; I wanted to be a truth once, I wanted to be a contradiction to everything around me. This blue room grows on me, with dandelion wallpaper; the light burns my eyes; Sometimes when I wake up in the middle of the day, I miss the Sun in my room, I miss the taste of dawn on my lips, shaping them into verses, letting blackbirds out of my heart; So I stole the only ticket to escape, took the last train home, Packed my life in a suitcase and left for the snow; I, who wanted to paint the rainbow with black and white, make the Sun jealous; And today I built my grave, buried the last of my lies and stitched the Sun to my face.
Standing Alone By: Oli Spleen With undoubtedly good intentions, my mother had decided it would do her children good to learn manners and be “well spoken” as she put it. She was from a more middle class background than my dad whose father’s family had escaped the slums of London’s East End. Back then the thinking was that an eloquently delivered voice and good etiquette could take you up in the world. Even my dad’s own dad Edwin who had survived this world of poverty as a child, was something of a working class snob who had made many shoddy attempts at rewriting his family history. One example of this could clearly be seen in a photograph of my dad John as a young boy wearing a blazer which his dad had bought him and had badly drawn a crest in chalk on one pocket so that friends of the family or whoever, might be fooled into thinking that John went to a decent school. My dad also told me of hearing about an uncle who had committed suicide by drinking Jeyes Fluid on the banks of the river Thames. I learned that after this incident my grandad
would pretend that this brother had never existed. Edwin also censored family albums to make it look like my dad had only married once instead of three times, this appeared particularly disconcerting seeing as my dad’s first daughter was almost as old as his current wife (my mother). When Edwin first met my mother Trish, he took my dad to one side and said “Don’t mess this one up son, she’s posh, your kids could go to university”. Years later I discovered that there were whole branches of our family who we didn’t even know existed with the same surname as us, living in Hastings. I stumbled across them and made contact soon after the advent of Facebook when looking for other people in the area with the surname Speer. At first Linzi who I had messaged about this didn’t think we could be related at all, until she spoke to her dad and realised that her and my grandad were brothers. They all seemed to be lovely people but appeared surprised that we had never met. When I spoke to my dad about this he told me that their family were never introduced to us as Edwin had decided they were “too rough” for us to meet. When I broke this news to my newly found cousin Linzi, she took it well and laughed. Snobbishness and belief in a concept of class, I explained, were not notions I had inherited at all. My dad was keen to attempt to restore some of the damage his father had done in his efforts to censor the family history. He had told me how as a child he remembered visiting some “dark skinned” aunts. Later research lead him to discover that quite probably much of his mother’s side of the family had gypsy blood. This instantly appealed to me as I was always hoping
that I had a more diverse bloodline than just white English. Years later I would entertain a notion based on the prominence of strong noses in my dad’s family, that some of these East End Speer’s from which I’m descended, may even be part Jewish. I still have hope that I have Jewish blood, though sadly this premise remains mere speculation, as we still know very little of that area of family history. All that my dad uncovered, was that a great grandmother of his used to wear a cloth cap and smoke a pipe whilst making a living selling junk which she pushed from place to place in a wheel barrow. It‘s clear to me these people really suffered and struggled just to survive. The inequality and stuffiness of the English class system and its inherent snobbery remains anathematic to me, though I would imagine that Edwin had experienced some very hard times, for him to feel the need to erase his heritage and deny the very existence of much of his own family in this way. Unfortunately starting at Silverdale Primary School speaking like I did, I soon became a social reject as I was perceived to be posh, privileged and rich by children who, to add insult to injury, owned toys that were far beyond my family’s budget. For a while I thought Santa knew that I was somehow intrinsically bad deep inside as, unlike many of the other children, our Christmas stockings consisted mostly of walnuts and satsumas with a few cheap toys and a net sack containing chocolate coins. The usual thing kids would say was “You’re posh, I bet you think you’re better
than me” when in reality I didn’t think I was better than anyone. Paradoxically they were prejudging me with an assumption that I was prejudging them. If anything I had an inferiority complex for being the odd one out as I had no friends at school back then. On the first day at Silverdale I had been rejected by the other boys on the premise that I had “girls Lego”. I thought that the “Fabuland” Lego figures with individual animal heads were far more interesting to play with than the standard figures which all had the same basic yellow head. I soon also realised that I just wasn’t naturally able to play like the boys did at all and so on the way back from school that first day I asked my mother “Why am I not a girl? I don’t feel like a boy” to which she replied “You wouldn’t want to be a girl because that would mean you’d have to marry a man” I didn’t bring the question up again. Men seemed to me at that age to be distant, authoritarian and disapproving, so marrying one felt like the last thing I wanted to do. I liked women far more. Some of my earliest memories of the days before starting primary school involved sitting in the kitchen with my mother and her friends, listening to their conversation. I don’t know if my mother thought I wasn’t listening or that I couldn’t fully understand but I clearly remember her often saying “All men are bastards” to her friend Wendy to which I remember piping in with - “But mummy won’t I grow up to be a man?” her reply was - “You won’t be like that Oliver, you’re different”. I clearly remember being worried about turning into a man as I couldn’t relate to them at all, the thought of growing facial hair and becoming serious and disapproving was so far from any future I had imagined for myself. I
remember seeing my dad cut himself shaving and being frightened that one day I would have to scrape a razor across my face which would most likely result in bleeding. The one small comfort was that Jim Henson, the creator of The Muppet Show which I so adored, had a beard and had retained and developed his creativity as opposed to repressing it as so many man seemed to me to do. It was clear that Jim had far from losing his sense of fun, so maybe I could grow up to be like him if I couldn’t be female like my sister, my mother, my grandma and all the women who I felt so close to and held so dear. My maternal grandmother Inez was known to everyone as Molly, she was a wonderfully bohemian woman with a compassionate soul, who wore colourful outlandish clothes and had hair that was dyed a bright red. She also painted oil paintings and sculpted in clay, often making us lampshades and figurines of our favourite animals and cartoon characters. She allowed us to paint in oils from a young age too. Visiting her was always fun as she indulged us in every way possible. She had lost her eyebrows in her youth and would let us draw them on for her which, unlike the meticulous brows which she would apply for herself, would more often than not make her look like some kind of angry clown. Nonetheless as her beloved grandchildren had applied them, to show how much she loved us she would proudly wear these ridiculous eyebrows all day long, even on trips to the shops. Years later when my sister Kate had
children of her own who would enjoy doing bizarre makeovers on me, putting Hello Kitty grips in my hair and painting my face like a Cy Twombly canvass, she told me that she thought that - in my permissiveness and encouragement of the girls’ creativity - I was to my nieces the equivalent of how our grandma had been to us. Knowing how much Kate had loved our grandma, I felt that this was the biggest compliment I could receive from her, so was deeply flattered. My sister being over two years older, had developed considerably more sophisticated games than I had and I was envious of her imagination. She would often take on the persona of a rather strict housewife called Mrs Smithmanther who had two daughters Jane and Dorothy, whom Mrs Smithmanther would push around in a pram in the form of dolls. When she was playing this character Kate was bossy and would take no nonsense from her daughters or anyone else for that matter. At other times Kate would take on the role of the Smithmanther daughters, if she was Dorothy all would be calm as Dorothy was very well behaved but when she was the naughty, disobedient Jane all hell would break loose. Today my sister has three daughters, the youngest of whom she named Dorothy. I often joke that Kate has grown up to become Mrs Smithmanther, yet wisely she chose not to have a daughter Jane. I loved dressing up at grandma’s as she had an amazing array of bizarrely garish, often psychedelic women’s clothes and hats which dated mostly from the 60’s and 70’s, so it was never hard to find a persona when decked out in these garments. Equally Kate and grandma seemed to enjoy putting makeup on me which I also
loved. Our grandma had many friends with what seemed to us to be wonderfully exotic, extraordinary names such as “Yvonne Banning-Lover” and “Bunny Warren” and it was from this list of luminaries that I chose the name for my alter ego “Jean Farnfield”, who I had decided presented a television gardening programme. These hours at grandmas were such fun that I was always sad to go. I remember clearly my mother coming to pick us up and scrubbing the makeup off my face telling me that my dad wouldn’t approve but nonetheless sometimes traces of the makeup stayed on. My dad was ex Royal Marines so he had learned to keep things bottled up and saw emotions as a sign of weakness, so we never saw him cry. He was seventeen years older than my mother so he had been a teenager before the advent of Rock ‘n’ Roll in the mid 1950’s and therefore (as teenagers didn’t really exist before the advent of Rock ‘n’ Roll) he had never really been a teenager, only a young man whose duty it was to be ready to fight for his country should there be another war. In retrospect I don’t think he had allowed himself time to fully grieve for the loss of his second wife who had died of a mysterious illness shortly before he had met Trish. All this bottled up emotion had resulted in a no-nonsense man who in my earliest memories had little understanding of or empathy for children. “Bloody nonsense” was a term he applied to many things, especially at meal times when to even ask for a glass of water to wash the food down was seen as an insubordinate distraction from the meal itself. This day
however I knew I must have done something unforgivable as he couldn’t even bring himself to look at me as he frowned and growled in distain to my mother - “The boy’s been playing silly buggers again, wearing makeup”. I didn’t understand what I had done that was supposed to be so wrong as I had felt so happy and free dressing up at my grandmas, it just felt natural and fun to wear makeup and those kind of clothes. In dressing up with her and my sister there was none of the shame and confusion I had felt when I had tried on my dad’s suit aged four and found myself to be strangely aroused by wearing something associated with these distant and alien beings that are known as “men”. It wasn’t that it was my father’s suit that it had affected me in this way, it was simply that it was clothing that was associated with being masculine which was something so far from my understanding that it excited and baffled me in equal measure and caused me to feel my first disturbing rush of arousal which made my penis erect. Certain items of masculine clothing had and continue to have for me, the kind of perverse allure that to dress in women’s clothing must have to some heterosexual male transvestites. The shame I felt flushed through my body and I hurriedly removed the garments and tried in vain to fold them to appear as they had when I first found them, terrified at the response from my dad who would surely see the guilt that my very being undoubtedly reeked of. To my surprise on seeing the pile of clothing he patted me on the head, smiled and said “Ahh, the boy wants to be like his dad”. It was then that I realised that his perception of me was worlds away from how I felt inside. As the years passed I would find ways to
bridge the chasm between his world and mine, I developed a love of pirates as it was a means of me being flamboyant and expressive under the guise of something seemingly masculine which was easy for him to understand. He went to great lengths to indulge and nurture this interest, even enabling me to sleep in a real ship’s hammock which he rigged up in my bedroom. As the years passed his harsh exterior softened and we developed a bond. With encouragement from my mother, he would read to me at night and later he would take me camping and on trips to Portsmouth to see HMS Victory and the Royal Marines Museum. My sister had made friends at Silverdale and so soon started to lose much of the accent which my mother had thought would hold us in good stead. I remember her deep disapproval at my sister’s changed voice and as I was far more under my mother’s influence than anyone else’s, having no real friends to influence me, I retained much of her “well spoken” accent whilst slowly diluting it with inflections inspired by The Muppet Show or visiting relatives from other countries. This was an attempt to appease my mother whilst not sounding too posh to the ears of the other school kids. However, this endeavour to try to please everyone ultimately only distanced and alienated me from society even further. To this day, virtually every day of my life I am confronted with people who are convinced that I am not English at all and won’t even accept my explanation of why I talk the way I do, believing instead that I’m some foreigner who is trying to play a bad joke on them.
One memory of that first year in infant school was of an assembly when, in a break from the usual compulsory hymns to Jesus, we were made to stand up and dance to songs such as “The Hokey Cokey” and “If You’re Happy And You Know It Clap Your Hands”. Being a rather serious child who perhaps took things too literally, I had trouble with some of the lyrics – “If you’re happy and you know it and you really want to show it, if you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands”. I didn’t clap until a teacher intervened with - “Come on Oliver, clap your hands”. On instruction I did as asked but I felt that in doing so I wasn’t being honest with myself. Those lines had plunged my brain into existential self-analysis mode; was I really happy? If I was I certainly didn’t “know it” and even if I did know it, would I “really want to show it”? It would have been far more helpful to me had the lyrics read “Clap like an idiot regardless of your emotional state”. As I didn’t have any real friends I would spend most playtimes walking laps of the school playground alone. On rare occasions my sister who was over two years older, would let me play with her and her friends. I so desperately wanted to feel part of their gang but because I could be very annoying to her as many younger brothers are, being invited to play their games didn’t happen often. I did also spend time with the school’s other social outcast but this girl seemed so vacant and unimaginative that I had to invent the entire plots of all our games myself. Then one day my dad brought me a glove puppet frog, he was fatter in appearance than The Muppet Show’s Kermit and furrier with a yellow stomach. I named him Croker and perfected a voice for him
that wasn’t a million miles from Kermit’s voice, though somewhat more bad tempered, world-weary and lethargic. I took Croker to school and all at once the other children would come up to talk to him. I was still largely ignored though I was receiving some attention by association. Most often the children would put a finger in Croker’s mouth which he would spit out in disgust whilst screwing his face up with “Eugh, how would you like it if I put my finger in your mouth”. This happened so often that I soon realised that a great many people do and say pretty much the same things as everyone else. Before long Croker had become well known, if not famous around the whole school. I who had no friends or normal social skills beyond politeness and good manners (which in that environment were a considerable hindrance to any hope of my social assimilation) had suddenly found a
way to communicate with and be known by virtually everyone in the school, albeit through the medium of a glove-puppet frog. By then I had given up on any hopes to be accepted as an equal or to attempt to pass myself off as something approximating what may be perceived as “normal” but I was slowly finding ways to carve my own path and cultivate a unique way of thinking and existing based solely on my own rules and standards. Whilst I still didn’t hold any of the notions of superiority or prejudice that I had been perceived as having based on my accent, it was however becoming abundantly clear to me that whatever I was, I was different. I had started to feel as if the wider world’s notions of gender and class which we were all supposed to conform to, were utterly nonsensical and irrelevant. It felt as if these rules simply didn’t apply to me at all. I began to consider myself no better or worse than anyone else but I felt as if I stood outside of their categories and definitions. On one occasion we were read a story in which the central character was described as “a loner”. “Does anyone know what that word means?” – said the teacher. When no answers were forthcoming she answered “It’s someone like Oliver”. How could she say that! - I thought, when Croker was rapidly making me the most well-known person in the entire school. Though something in me knew that she was right, in that environment I stood alone and maybe that wasn’t such a bad thing after all.
Still from the 2015 movie Room
Identity Riddles by Sailendra N Tripathi
Sometimes I wonder how my mother communicated with my Father in the pre-whatsapp days. They could understand each other perfectly. But now..with..email..facebook..whatsapp Do we really understand each other? I read Shakespeare Simone de Beauvoir Betty Friedan. Virginia Woolf. But do i know more than you Mother? The food you served was tastier than those at the best clubs
Such crowd on the streets Flights overhead I am still looking for summer mornings when you’d picked malli flowers from earthBirds and rainbows and Pablo Neruda from up above. I am battered by identity riddles Shall return to you Mother, again and again.
Free Will By Debashis Saha
Still from the 2010 film Incendies
Nothing Said by Suzanne Smith
The sound of the egg, bubbling as it boils Takes me back to childhood, of my mother standing at the stove, tears falling into the soup Black eye rising on her face Nothing said Sardines on cream crackers, an appeasement When woken in the night by a scream My cries misinterpreted as hunger A bruise on the giving hand arm is seen Nothing said
Loud footsteps up and down the stairs, The chasing of a boy and his supposed protector, The leather belt cracking, sometimes connecting, A boys heart broken, made hard to parenthood Nothing said Thoughts that shaped me, moulded me damaged, trampled, then strengthened me. These things that helped make me whole, The blues of life, the rock and roll The thoughts are sad, but that's not bad because something has been said
Chokher Bali by Debapriyo Sarkar
Still from the HBO series The Leftovers
Hands by Durga Prasad Panda Durga Prasad Panda is an accomplished bilingual poet who writes both in English and Odia His work have appeared in prestigious journals such as Debonair, Chandrabhaga, Indian Literature, Little Magazine, Sunstone, The journal of Poetry Society etc. He has also translated the seminal works of great poets like Sri. J P Das. He holds a masters degree in commerce from the Delhi University and currently works for the Department of Statistics, Govt. Of India as a Superitending Offier.
Even though they lie stretched beside me all the time these very hands of mine are actually not mine. May be they belong to someone else altogether. Or, may be they are on their own, I am not sure.
Earlier when they were innocent and soft they used to be a playful lot. Now that they have grown up, these hands, once so close to me, appear remote. With each passing day I hear them slipping farther away from me into some dark and deep forest of time. These my hands, my most intimate stranger, are actually not mine at all.
Renascence by Sarah-Jane Hood
A Letter to Kevin Spacey By: Jess Dyson-Houghton Dear Kevin Spacey, To say that I am angry with you is an understatement. Your name comes up in conversation with friends and colleagues when discussing the news. Their disbelieving and somewhat stricken ‘did you hear-?’ tone is drowned out by my fury, my disgust. I don’t mean to do it, don’t meant to ‘be that person’, but I do it nonetheless. I am furious with you, incandescent on numerous levels. You were always on the periphery of my vision growing up. You had a recognisable voice and face, and yet sometimes I struggled to place you. I know your voice as GERTY in the film Moon, as Hopper in A Bug’s Life. You were there in Se7en, one of my favourite films, and again in The Usual Suspects. L.A Confidential of course also springs to mind. Most recently, I rapped my knuckles with you in Netflix’s series House of Cards and I rooted for you to win despite
knowing you played the villain. Now you play a different kind of villain, but I no longer root for you to win, no longer rap my knuckles in time with yours. I am disappointed, though disappointed feels like an understatement. A parent is disappointed with their teenager when they come home drunk from a party, when they miss curfew. I am crestfallen, bitter, galled and livid. And I want to explain to you why. Your statement not only refuses to properly acknowledge the accusations levelled against you, but also serves as an attempt to align yourself with a minority. A minority you have previously chosen to ignore, a minority you are now hurting with your actions. One of the most pervasive and ugly myths that surround those of us who are not straight, particularly men it should be said, is that we are not safe to be left alone around children. That we are predators, perverts, worming our way into civilised society and leaving bruises in our wakes. Your statement, your easy dismissal of Anthony Rapp’s allegations alongside your coming out, will now serve to fuel those bigots who believe the worst about us all. Your coming out and these allegations will be brought up over and over again, it will silence some of us who are still closeted for fear of being likened to you, and it will hurt many more of us who have to live with the homophobia, the bile, that your actions will encourage.
As more allegations appear, the truth is evident. Your personality kept you safe for years, your power cocooned you and allowed you to act deplorably, to create a culture of silence surrounding your name. But no longer. The only way I can find to describe you now comes from an unlikely source. Frenchy, from the musical Grease, gives a description of men that I now wish to bestow upon you alone. You, Mr Spacey, are too low for even the dogs to bite. Henceforth in my mind you are an amoeba on a flea, on a rat. I may watch movies with you in (I refuse to give up things that I love because of you, after all), but your talent means little to me now. Your personality and words no longer drown out your actions, and your actions tell me everything I need to know about what you have done, where you have been. I hope fervently that you see your actions from the viewpoint of an outsider, that you see how you have used your power and that you reform. Perhaps in time you will make a comeback, you will turn public opinion back in your favour. I wouldn’t be surprised. Worse people have made bigger comebacks. People will once again rap their knuckles in time with you and root for you. But you’ll remain an amoeba to me. Never yours, Jess
Still from the 2010 film Winter's Bone
Beautiful be damned! I want to be ugly where no one looks at me twice or maybe does a double take. Curves be damned I wanna thrive in rough edges and triangle like hips bones sticking out and not a fistful of muscles to be felt. shapes do not define me, I want to be this jungle of cacophony-ness that shifts shapes right in front of your eyes and if you were ensnared by my voluptuous sashays and my full lips, I want to test whether my broken nose and my prickly heels draw you in as well! Will you kiss my neck when my jawline seems to go on forever and will you kiss it still when my folds and double chins will bump into your grace and not fit into you like a puzzle piece?
Beautiful be Damned! By Sonali Mohapatra
I will be all nails and needles will you be my yarn? This thing between us, is it based on my body? cz i am so much more than this, baby. I love like the crazy and i kiss like fire I blow minds when my words go spit fire I question and question and ask all the why’s I accept and show affection when you just need your emotions stirred. In a cold night, i can be your blanket or your fireplace and on a hot day, I can be like the wind that will cool your face, I am tropical rain storms which will come to give you respite when you have been praying for a miracle all your life.
Will you love me when I make loving impossible because it won’t be the shit you read in romance novels and expect to be perfect? Sometimes, I will be a half burnt candle dripping wax on your palms searing, burning, but moulding according to how you want and then right next moment, I will be hard mountain, only designed to be immovable and hard. I will change and grow and learn like the human mind is supposed to be nobody is the same ever when will the world learn this thing? Love is not a constant! Unless it is change.. My identity morphs and grows and will take you with it in exchange, Let us go for a walk and a stroll, sometimes i feel quite wrong if I am not a square peg trying to fit into a round hole.
Yawp! By: Jo Bailey Today I had this word inscribed on my arm in ink, a word important to me for so many reasons. This isn’t short. Perhaps not long, but not short. I'm not the best at brevity but expressing my stories as I need to is important sometimes. I think without my giving the story, I can think of a little handful of people to whom this might be very or vaguely familiar. Is it any more so if I mention Robin Williams or Peter Weir or Ethan Hawke? But this isn't a guessing game. It's a story, and it's mine, so the story I shall tell. Do you remember the film Dead Poets Society? That heartrending, but heart-filling tale of the lease of life given by literature, of the power of words, and that of wonderful, passionate teaching; of the gravity of a moment, the way in
which a single scene or interaction can transform confidence, change relationships, spark fire; of the warning it gives of the pain that can be felt from having one's passions stifled? Remember that film. Remember one scene in which Robin Williams' character, the beloved English teacher John Keating, has asked his students to each write a poem and perform it before the class? They do; it's an ordinary lesson until that one point in which Ethan Hawkes' character, Todd Anderson, a shy, unassuming young man of seventeen is hailed to speak. And he stumbles and makes excuses and freezes I would have done the same - and John Keating, this beloved mentor, he points to Walt Whitman whose photo presides over the classroom above the blackboard, and Keating speaks Whitman's lines from the poem Song of Myself (written in his voice as a 37 year old, which I am shockingly not that far from): 'I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.' And read it again, slowly, punctuate the words and speak out the syllables as Keating does: 'I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.' And what does this mean to you? To Keating, to Todd, to this young girl watching? What happens next? What happens next is one of the most intimate moments between mentee and mentor: Keating urges Todd to close his eyes and sound his own Barbaric Yawp; to close out the rest of the world, its laughs and judgements, its self-consciousness and preconceptions; in that moment, nothing and no one else exists, there is
only Todd, only Todd, that boy who was shy and voiceless and without words or confidence, with his mentor. And as a viewer we see the transformation of Todd the shy and voiceless into Todd the poet, the Poet, with passion and confidence and Words. He is given the lease of life. He sounds his barbaric yawp, over the rooftops of his classmates' heads. So, one, this tattoo is of that. Let me tell you a story. There is so much of me in that boy. When I was at school we studied Dead Poets Society. I remember writing an essay about the film, and it was around the time of writing it, aged fourteen or fifteen, I found my voice, too. (The essay is probably awful for that reason but I have it somewhere.) So much about the film resonated, slightly consciously at the time, and probably more so since. What wouldn't we all do to have our own John Keating? Some of us are lucky enough to've had one, some of us even maybe had a couple that have come close. Let me tell you the story. I'll embarrass her now, but this isn't just my story, but because of my years at the time, it is. I had my own John Keating, my own formative teacher and lover of words and rejector of rules who encouraged this finding of my voice. Would I have words without her? Perhaps. Would I love them so viscerally, so passionately, would I admire the craft of words and their play? Perhaps. Perhaps not. Those formative years are so crucial. Two, this tattoo is of that. And three, I shan't tell you too much more of a story, for this story is becoming long. But a snippet:
Whitman wrote this poem, 'Song of Myself', Song of Hisself at that age I am not far from. I have lost and found and lost and found my voice and self so many times over. My mind and my life is haphazard and passionate; time and time over I return to words and poetry, through them I scream when the world would have me silent or feeling helpless. Through them, within them, I find my self, myself, My self, my Self. And that sense of self, that is found in my voice, that nakedness, that seeing the world through my own eyes in the way that only my eyes can, *that* is so resonant with Whitman's utterance of his 'barbaric yawp'; it is angry and discontent, passionate and unbridled, a naked and raw, vulnerable and visceral, both cautious and frenzied Song of Myself I find when I return to words. And that, that I should heed, for each and every time I stray from words, I am no longer myself, and each time I return, I rediscover the fierce fortitude they give me. So, three, this tattoo is that. Thank you, Joe Say. ‌ (POSTSCRIPT: That last one is actually three and four: Whitman and poetry and Self; and a reminder to me to keep writing and speaking my truest voice, to keep uttering my own barbaric yawp. And there is a fifth, a reminder of the great man that was Robin Williams, I have adored his acting for so long. He played the most wonderful characters and is most sorely missed by many.
But this story was so long, and these addenda would have taken away from the most poignant and personal notes of it.)
Letter to Amy By: Shantashree Mohanty
Sweet Amy, I love you so much. Your essence engulfs my life in a way that is subtle, yet so substantial. The sincerity in your art was bottomless. You wrote with heart and professed with vigour. Not a single day goes by when you cease to inspire me to be true to myself. To be curious and kind and strive to be better. I hope you know that. The first time I heard one of your songs, I must have been in High School. It was your cover of '60s girl group, The Shirelles’ popular song ‘Will you still love me tomorrow’. I don’t remember who was playing it, but I remember what it did to me. Your eclectic music conjured up strange emotions in my heart that were way beyond my abilities of comprehension. No one had made me feel like that before. Your vocals were just so powerful and edgy, yet incredibly naked… I wept.
Back then, I used to listen to the tracks from ‘Frank’ all the time. Sometimes it was just hours and hours of playing, replaying and singing ‘What is it about men’. My friends didn’t get why I was so obsessed with you. They found your songs to be extremely edgy and dark. I didn’t bother to convince. I mean, Contralto is so rare in female artists…but you were the queen of it. It was so encouraging for someone like me who predominantly finds comfort in the Lower Octave. I was mesmerised by the ease with which you carried classical music with your voice and fearlessly mixed Jazz and Soul to create your own brand. You had what they call ‘Swag’. You introduced me to good Jazz music, Girl! You made me develop an ability to grasp the beauty of variations. Because of you I started listening to Sarah Vaughan (I know, I know, your childhood Idol), Billie Holiday, Nina Simon and Louis Armstrong. I owe you. I know that’s a weird order of events. But Well… In 2006 ‘Back to Black’ came and you became a global artistic sensation. You swept the Emmys two years later. Everybody was playing ‘Rehab’. Everybody was too busy grooving, to take a hint, of what was coming. After you departed, the internet was flooded with articles like ‘What really happened to Amy Winehouse’, ‘Inflated Legacy of Amy Winehouse’… I was disgusted. Why is it that people seldom talk about your rich work and more often than not, sit in judgement of whether or not you were worthy of your ill-fated fame? In my mind palace, I like to keep you far away from all that hullabaloo about the ‘27 Club’, ‘the addictions’, ‘the cameras’ and ‘the loved ones who just couldn’t see’.
With me, you don’t have to shield yourself with the beehive and all that blasting ink and the loud make up. That’s because for me, you are just Amy, who loved music and books and being around her friends. Amy who moved me. Me…a perpetual misfit and manic depressive, who has always had an eternally pure relationship with music. …Amy who let love vanquish her. You and your pride! I’ve never seen someone cherish their disappointments like you did. May be that was your idea of true intimacy. May be you really had that many legitimate expectations. You know, Salinger went away to Europe to avoid the explosive fame of ‘Catcher in the Rye’, a book you must have adored for sure. In an interview much later, he said, “I love to write, and I assure you I write regularly, but I write for myself, for my own pleasure. And I want to be left alone to do it.” You were like that weren’t you Amy? But people just wouldn’t let you be. People are often relentless when it comes to something they can’t understand, something that moves them but they can’t interpret it. They have an indomitable urge to destroy the source of such unbearable beauty. They shrouded you with images of rebellion, so you could be idolised and they could get a piece of your impending immortality. Anyway, you must have been pleased when Tony Bennett said in an interview after you passed that you are one of the few artists he’d ever met who ‘sang it the right way’ and that you were a ‘true Jazz performer’.
I’m so grateful to Asif Kapadia for making that documentary on you. It won the Oscars this year! It showed the tender and beautiful side of you that was for long obscured by the evil lenses. Of course I wish you were here. But I also bask in your moxie, the strength of your earnestness, that made you who you are (Yes, for me your soul endures). Your immortal passion has an inexplicable power that makes life seem so vital and at the same time so futile. Your painfully honest songs have become unusual means of catharsis for me. You're my friend...a great love of my life. In grace, glory and the profound power of music, keep coming Darling. Forever yours, Shantashree
The Horned Goddess By Jess Dyson-Houghton
Still from the 2003 film Lost in Translation
Fenêtres By: Jack Setford I am home. I have been staring at this blank page (no longer blank!) for the whole flight, waiting for inspiration. Finally, as I gaze out of the window and see the hazy blue waters of Lac Léman, the mountains blanketed in snow, I know how my journal should begin: I am home. It’s been twenty long years, and now I have returned. I translated ‘return’ on the plane’s wifi. Je retourne, je rentre, je reviens… Which one is it? Maybe all of them; I can’t remember the difference. Too many words for a single word. It will be good to practise my French. The man sitting next to me is English, so I will have to wait a little longer. He is here on business, a banker or some such. Some attempts were made at conversation shortly after we took off, but it quickly became clear to both of us how boring his profession (nay, his life!) is. I say to both of us, because I am sure it is quite possible to forget how dull your life is on those rare occasions when someone else shows an interest,
and I really did try my best. It broke my heart to see this man realise all over again what an insipid creature he is. Perhaps it would have been better if I hadn’t spoken to him, but I had hoped to practise my French. We will be landing soon, and the disembodied voice will request that I return (remettre, rendre, renvoyer?) my tray to its upright position. So I will bid thee au revoir, until I have landed. *** I allowed myself to waffle, when I was writing on the plane, but now my head is clearer. I have reflected on my choice of words, and decided that ce n’est pas mon retour, c’est ma renaissance! This is a rebirth, not a return. A new journal, all those blank pages waiting to be filled. A new life, a new man. I ordered a glass of red wine at the airport, and now I am writing as I drink, enjoying my new freedom. I tried to order in French, but the waiter realised quickly that I was struggling and spoke to me in English instead. As if he were doing me a favour! It is nearly two o’clock in the afternoon. From my little table next to the bar I see people rushing around the airport, although perhaps rushing isn’t the right word; nobody rushes at two o’clock in the afternoon. They are making a show of it, huffing and puffing, papers under their arm, smartphones in hand. You can see the stress on their faces, but it’s not real, it’s a performance. Really these people have never been happier. It’s two o’clock in the afternoon, and they are not at work! They have escaped their desks, escaped their colleagues, broken free of their
responsibilities. Now they are travelling, and for a few hours at least they are free. But it wouldn’t do to let it show, oh no! So they huff and puff, and walk as quickly as they can without exerting any real effort. But I, I am different. I have nowhere to pretend to rush to, I can enjoy my wine and let the world scurry by. I take another sip, and I cannot help but smile. I have finished my wine now. I hesitate to move, I want to savour this moment. I reread what I have written since I sat down. I chew my pen. I know where I am going next, I will take the train to Gare de Cornavin, but there is no hurry. Maybe I will look around the airport a little, perhaps try and find a bookshop. *** Geneva moves past the windows. I do not recognise anything yet. Perhaps I’ve been away too long. The city of my childhood… I will know my way once I reach Cornavin, certainly. I will go down the Rue du MontBlanc until I reach the lake. The lake at least cannot have changed much! Of course, the water will be different water. I wonder how many years it would take for every single drop of water in Lac Léman to be freed and join the clouds, to fall as rain somewhere else. I suppose most of the water finds its way back to the lake, perhaps ending up as snow on the Alps, eventually melting and trickling down the mountain slopes until at last it returns home. Like me; long ago I was displaced from my home, sent swirling into the air. But slowly, surely, I have found my way
back, inevitable as water in a mountain stream. I picked up a copy of Jean-Paul Sartre’s La Nausée at the airport. I remember a friend back in England had recommended it to me, many years ago. Before opening my journal I read the first few pages of the novel. The novel consists of the diary entries of one Antoine Roquentin: an interesting conceit. I pause with my pen above my own diary, wondering if merely by the act of writing I am condemning myself to live within a work of existential fiction. I have tried keeping a journal before, but somehow I have never been able to keep up the habit. I remember what the problem was now. I became far too preoccupied with the journal itself, and the process of writing a journal. The journal becomes an art form, as if it were trying to become a work of fiction. Every page must read like a novel, every instant of my life must hold some interest. Away from the pages, my mind becomes consumed with the question of how I shall write down this moment, or that moment. Inevitably, when faced with the task of recording another day of tedium and routine, some elaboration, exaggeration even, is required. And thus the journal stops being genuine, stops being me. It takes on a life of its own, and runs away from me. I shall try not to let that happen this time. This time there will be no tedium! This is the beginning of my story. I have returned home, I am back where I belong. How could I be anything other than genuine? *** A long day, very tired. But I must write. I
am in my apartment now. It is a cosy place, if a little bare. The bedroom has a large double bed and not much else. I was hoping for a desk where I might write; at the moment I am sitting cross-legged on the bed. The walls are a milky blue that might be pleasant in the daytime, but looks pale and sickly by the light of my bedside lamp. There is a kitchen, small but serviceable. It will suffice. Hopefully I will not be here long anyway. It was a last minute arrangement, and far too expensive for what it is. The location is excellent, however. I am on the Rue de Montchoisy, in the Eaux-Vives district. A delightful little street, with a supermarket and a few restaurants, a half an hour walk from the Gare de Cornavin. This afternoon I took a stroll along the lakefront, waiting for memories to come back to me. We used to live in an apartment not far from here, I am sure of it, though I no longer remember which street it was. I walked along the little jetty to feel the spray of the Jet d’Eau, like I used to when I was a boy. The sun was starting to go down by that point; the scene was simply beautiful. Across the water little yachts swayed serenely, sunlight reflecting off a hundred ripples as they washed underneath their hulls. Wisps of cloud caught fire in the day’s last rays of sunlight, and across the water the hills were shining. I stood there and basked, a broad smile on my face. As I walked toward the shore I greeted strangers with a beaming ‘bonsoir’, inviting them to smile with me. Most did not. I am not grumpy enough for this city! I suppose for those who walk along the lakefront every evening it must
eventually lose some of its charm. So then, I am faced with a dilemma. I should like to walk there often, to feel the breeze on my face and the fresh air wash in from the water. But what a loss it would be when the novelty wears off. I can picture it now, I could see it in the eyes of the locals who would not smile at me: preoccupation. They are not there because it is beautiful, they are there because it less ugly. Less ugly than their workplaces, less ugly than their homes, less ugly than their wives, their husbands, their families. And with so many cares to trouble them, how frivolous it must seem to stand under the Jet d’Eau and simply enjoy it. For them the falling spray is like so many raindrops. I feel privileged. This is my home; I have known it since I was a child, but today was like seeing it for the first time. There is no joy like coming home. It’s like listening to a piece of music after as long a time. You still know the song, you know the words, the shape of the melody. But it has been rid of that stale flavour that comes from over-listening. Familiarity blended with novelty, the only way to properly experience something. I feel liberated, a cloud has been lifted from my eyes and I can see. I am home, and how wonderful it is! *** I am staring out of my window as I eat my breakfast. The kitchen has a small table with two rickety chairs. The window is tall, with eight panes laid out four by two. Bird shit streaks across one of them, old and crusty. The wood is mouldy and the white paint is peeling. For all this it is a beautiful fenêtre. The view that it grants of the Rue de Montchoisy is very quaint. I am on the top floor; to the right apartment
blocks line the street, painted in earthy shades of red and brown, potted plants and flowerbeds brightening up the balconies. To the left the road opens out on the Place du pré-l’Evêque, where grander buildings with steepled roofs overlook the already busy streets. Across the street I can see into another apartment, bigger than mine. I can see someone there, a woman walking around her kitchen. She’s wearing a baggy t-shirt but her tanned legs are bare. She puts a saucepan away into a cupboard, and then disappears into the next room. This window tells a story, like a good film. I’m not sure what the story is yet, but I shall keep watching, and hope to discover it. It’s 10 am, and it is Saturday. The best moment of the week. The weekend stretches before me like the blank pages of this diary; anything could happen. I didn’t sleep too well, unfortunately. I never sleep well in an unfamiliar place. I kept waking, thinking I was back in my bed at home. My back pain has returned too, that didn’t help. I shift in my seat, wincing in discomfort. I’ll ignore it for now, try to enjoy myself. My first full day in Geneva. I intend to make the most of it. *** The first thing I did was go shopping. I stocked up on groceries, toiletries, bought a few bottles of good Bordeaux wine. “Bonjour, monsieur,” said the woman at the till.
“Bonjour,” I said. She passed my items through the scanner. I packed them into bags. The supermarket bustled around us to a chorus of bleeps. “Forty-five francs twenty cents, please,” the woman said at last. I said one word, one word! Bonjour. How hard can it be to get right? I can speak French, damn it! I sullenly passed her a hundred franc note, and waited for my change. I went back to my apartment with my purchases. When I got to the foyer a man on his way out held open the door for me. He smiled as I thanked him; the first smile I have seen since I arrived in Geneva. As I ascended the stairs (I am afraid of lifts) I said it to myself, over and over again: “Bonjour, bonjour, bonjour.” It sounds correct in my ears. I had to put my bags down on the floor as I fumbled for my key to the apartment. “Bonjour, bonjour, bonjour.” I stood a while in the kitchen, staring out of the window. I watched the crowds of people moving up and down the street. A family of three dashed across the road as a car almost ploughed into them. I could hear the car honking as it revved its engine and sped on up the road. Across the street my neighbour has put on trousers now. She is sitting at her kitchen table, laptop open in front of her. She has long copper brown hair, falling in waves over the back of her chair. I can see the frown on her face as she bends in closer to her screen.
I thought, I should not be nosy, and turned away. “Bonjour, bonjour, bonjour.” *** This afternoon I walked up to the Jardin Botanique. It was a forty-five minute walk, but it was pleasant. After crossing to the other side of the river I walked along the lakefront. The sun had come out by then, and if it weren’t for the breeze off the lake it would have been warm. The elation I felt yesterday at arriving home has diminished… As I ambled through the Parc Mon Repos I could not appreciate the beauty of the place. The sun was shining, the grass and the trees were green and the breeze was refreshing. So what was wrong? For the first time since arriving here I feel like I don't belong. I am waiting for something to happen, I have realised. I am waiting for life to start happening. At the moment it is like I am not quite alive, not quite here. I am walking through the city, through its streets and parks. I am filling my time with walks and pleasant scenery, because if I did not then nothing would happen to me at all. My life here is like a seed, a tiny sprouting seed that must be given time to grow. At the moment there is nothing to say about it, it is insignificant. Soon I will start to take root, and a stem will appear above the soil, and I will be someone. At the moment I am no one, just a memory of who I used to be,
when I was a child, when I was a true Suisse and people would speak to me in French. So I must wait. I must be patient. But I am bad at waiting. It is like an itch. Waiting to be alive, waiting to be someone. And who will I be when I am? Someone, just someone, and that is better than no one. I am sitting outside a coffee shop now, I’ve been here an hour and a half. Away from the lakefront there is less of a breeze and the afternoon is warm. I sat for a while sipping coffee and reading La Nausée. It’s a disturbing read — I just finished reading a passage in which the protagonist, Antoine Roquentin, stares into a mirror and becomes lost in his own reflection. Not out of vanity. He stares at the features of his face, allowing his gaze to wander over his nose, his mouth, his cheeks, almost as if he were looking at a map, picking out interesting geographical features. He seems to find it difficult to find any meaning in those features, unable to attach words like ‘ugly’ or ‘handsome’ to it, unable to glimpse any humanity, unable to perceive emotion. “If you look at yourself too long in the mirror, you'll see a monkey.” I should beware of overanalysing who I am. I should not look too long in the metaphorical mirror, staring at the qualities that define me, the things that make me me. But it is hard, hard being in a new place, with no one to talk to, no one to distract me from myself. I have come face to face with myself and have discovered, almost like Monsieur Roquentin, that I do not recognise what I see.
I wrote yesterday: “how could I be anything other than genuine?” But how can I be genuine when I do not know who I am? I am back home, back where I belong, but this city has not yet returned my affections, has not taken me back into its embrace. ‘Who am I?’ is a dangerous question to ask. You may find that you are nobody. *** This evening I will not be soul searching. I was planning originally to make something of my Saturday evening, to go down to a bar, order a glass of wine and let the evening take me where it will. But the feelings that took over me this afternoon have left me timid. For now I will consent to be nobody — make the most of it, in fact! I have no responsibilities, nowhere to be. I am free, it seems, without a purpose, or even a personality to hold me back. Isn’t that what Jean-Paul Sartre’s writing is all about? True, radical freedom; freedom from everything, everyone. When Monsieur Roquentin looks into the mirror and sees only a lump of flesh, he has discovered that he is no one, he has broken free of himself. When you are no one you can be anyone! And now, for the first time in many years — perhaps my whole life — there is nothing around me, nobody around who can tell me who I am. I have to work it out for myself. I have to fill the blank pages of this diary. And I can fill them with whatever I choose. I am absolutely, fundamentally free. So I am going to relax, and let this freedom
wash over me. I shall not force the issue; I shall not go out into the world and look for a person to be. I shall drift through the void a little longer. I am sitting in my kitchen at my little table, writing and thinking and smiling. In a little while I will cook something, something simple, some pasta with a sauce. I bought a few vegetables earlier, courgettes, peppers… It will not be anything special, but it does not matter. Seven o’ clock. Ten past seven. Twenty past… I have eaten now. Somehow I cannot tear myself away from these pages, these empty pages, filling them up because if I don’t they will stay empty. These pages are me, these pages are me. Why am I so frightened? Across the street, there she is again. My neighbour. She is cooking. She looks tired. I can tell from the way that she slumps, the way her arms hang from her shoulders. She brushes her hair out of her eyes with her upper arm. I can see the gleam of sweat on her forehead in the glare of her kitchen lights. If she were to look this way she would see me too, just as clearly. What would she see? A twenty-eight year old man in a flannel shirt, the top three buttons undone, round glasses slowly sliding down his nose, his hand frantically gripping his pen, scratching away at his journal, filling the pages with his story. She doesn’t look at me though. She is wearing a loose fitting black tank top and pyjama bottoms. She, like me, has been
floating through the void today. I can tell. I can see it in that expressionless face, in those listless eyes. I wish I could tell her that the void is not a bad place to be. You can be anybody! I want to shout. But maybe it is too late for her. She is somebody. It’s been weighing her down for years. Even on a lazy Saturday, when all she had to do was catch up with her favourite tv shows, even then the spectre haunted her. It whispers in her ear, a thousand tiny voices, reminding her about all the things she is supposed to be worrying about, all the things she might forget, if for a moment she could just let go… Olivia, that will be her name. I will call her Olivia. She is part of my journal now, helping to fill the blank pages. I watch her for a long time. I watch her eat her meal. I cannot see what she is eating. She has her laptop open in front of her as she eats, watching something maybe, catching up on Netflix. She barely takes her eyes of the screen, her hand moving back and forth between her plate and her mouth. Both of us are captivated, both of us are tangled up in a story. At the moment she is my story. At the moment she is a book laid open — I can see everything about her. The way she has drawn her knees up to her chest. The way she absently twists her hair about her finger. The way she stares at her computer without blinking, and then after a few moments rubs her eyes with both her hands. And then she is gone. She puts her dirty dishes in her sink and disappears into the next room. She has left her laptop behind
on her kitchen table. Good. I can do something now, maybe I should watch some tv myself, or read a book. I am still here. I can’t pull myself away. The light is still on in her kitchen, its lurid glow creeping out onto the balcony. My pen has been hovering over my journal for how long, fifteen minutes, twenty? There’s no way I can move. After all, I am no one.
“I know,” he replies. “I’m sorry. You know I’m sorry.” “Yeah,” she says, scratching her neck, chewing her lip. “I’ll make it up to you, Olivia.” She laughs. A tired laugh, a laugh of resignation. She looks up at the ceiling, as if to exchange a knowing glance with God.
I don’t know how long it’s been, but there she is again. She is on the phone; she looks annoyed. She has stormed into the kitchen and is now looking around, wondering why she is there.
“You’d better,” she says. It’s a warning, sugar-coated perhaps, but the warning is there. I’ve had enough, it says. One more chance, it says.
Don’t go!
But she won’t leave him, of course she won’t. This is who she is. She loves and rages, loves and forgives. She could never leave him, because that wouldn’t be right, that would not be her.
She’s shouting now. If both our windows were open I would be able to hear her; that’s how loud she is shouting. One of her hands is gesticulating wildly, shaking at the air as if she were angry with the walls. Eventually her rage subsides. She takes a few steps backwards, bumps into the doorframe and her eyes close. She runs a hand through her hair, brushing the tangles out of her eyes. She is so tired. Who is she talking to, I wonder? A boyfriend, I think. Her eyes give it all away, the exasperation. This has happened a hundred times before and it will happen a hundred times more. I can see her forgiving him even now. She moves away from the wall, walks in circles a few times, eyes cast downwards as she listens to his apologies. “You promised,” she says, more of a reminder than a reprimand.
For a while today she had not known who she was, but now she has remembered. “I love you,” she says into the receiver.
Carved Voices
