words felt from what is observed, thought, lived, read, inspected and suspected... these are some of escobar's recent ones:
*
dirty dishes
there was once a mountain of dishes: dirty, dirty dishes.
male dirty dishes and female dirty dishes
who were fucking and fucking and having baby dirty dishes all the time.
and there was the smallest sink you can imagine
dirty? oh yes! she was dirty.
little, little sink
just right next to the filthy dish orgy.
imagine the sounds!
imagine the births!
imagine the smells!
and there,
you would always find a girl with two gloves,
she suffered from a very strange disease,
at the end of an alley, behind a petite door…
she suffered dish washing obsession: DWO
they had to be dirty! they had to be wild!
she couldn’t resist, a very strange disease,
her hands in the sink and eternity.
***
In-between FIFA and South Africa: An invisible sparkling line
Last Friday 11 of June, when all the world was waiting for the FIFA World Cup to begin, I was sitting in my couch with friends, vibrating and agitated as one might get about to witness an event that unifies the world as one: one world, one game, if I got it right. The countdown began and we were ready to see what South Africa had so longingly prepared. And it begun, an angelical South African girl dressed in a lovingly white dress blew sparkles to our faces and all around our brains. She wondered playfully through the streets of Johannesburg and innocently invited us to be her guests and to enjoy the 31-day journey we all had been waiting for!
The ritualistic dances and African culture were evoked by hundreds of performers, whose pride was quite overwhelming and fully captivating. Then the speeches began, an iconic symbol of the anti-apartheid movement giving us his wide smile with a fanatic outfit spread out joy and feelings of hope about human kind, reminding us how a split country once survived and what a united country could accomplish. The President of the FIFA took over speaking about what must and should be said, while we drunkenly discerned those words that must be spoken. And so it went on, the South African President followed through and gave a reminder of how life goes on, and on, and on.
Then both leaders approached the dazzling line of players and I saw the President of South Africa and the President of the FIFA proudly shaking the hands of the South African and Mexican best soccer players. Though, I couldn’t help feeling that something was not right, my face had gone low, and my soul went quite numb.
The shake was fine, I truly believe that it was honest and fund of joy, their expressions were accurate, their breaths on time, power was bumping out from every shake, it was almost like blowing sparkles to my face! It was magnificent to experience such accomplished adults out there in the field of sports and to the view of our world!
I just couldn’t believe the invisibility of a third sparkling line; so far from notice and in between, a line of children to the view of the world, overwhelmed by excitement but so horribly invisible to such gifted representatives of our adult ruled world. They looked up to them and no one seemed to mind.
I don’t know about you, but I have heard many children say that they want to be policemen, firemen, soccer players or even presidents! So, why are they standing there, in between their dreams, men that speak about union, about one world, one game, and be so invisible to them? Why are they standing there if they won’t get any adult attention or just a powerful handshake? Are they meant to be an icon of morality, of connectedness to what they might become?
After the shakes, the children disappeared and I went back to my life, to the game, to my adult plans, to watching more commercials full of children dreaming about soccer days. Even so, I must recall the UNICEF and its discourse to give children a voice. Maybe before that, we should give them a hand shake at the biggest broadcasted event in the world, and then, start talking about their voice, about child friendly cities, about child friendly World Cups, to actually make them visible in this world, fully present in our small and big games and joy.
And if I am lucky enough to have you: child, reading my letter right now, don’t look up, shake our hands, give us a ride, please spark up our adult minds!
photo getty images
***
red string__________________.
there was once a string and a girl, the string was red, soft and warm, made out of wool hanging in pairs by a dot, the dot was in front of the girl and the girl had two hands tied away. She was sitting in a wooden chair, yes, wooden like the skin of a moan, full of cracks filling the absence of her own dance and tongue.
Always looking down, you could never see her dotted eyes; she had eyes with purple points and a little knot dripping within. The two eyes had fallen years before, when a wooden gun fired the dot that held these pairs. So dotted eyes, gun load and face, all licked her away.
And there was a little window hanging from a paper line, no point in giving you a key, just point a finger to a hole and find an eraser in this world. Then close your ears and take a walk until you reach a wall, erase one time and then point a dot.
Imagine her hands going out, imagine her tongue rolling around, and then, take a gun and shoot a pointless wooden bullet away, now you can look at the chair and then realise what a little string and a moan you can master for her.
***
what if you were a rock,
and i gave you two eyes and a mouth,
find some fabric and sew a little pillow for you to sleep in,
and then,
carry you in my pocket every single day and night.
and what if i called you ROBOT
***
play:ground
dedication to a child soldier
'My dear souldiers, or rather my brothers and sisters, since the ties of blood, as well as the lack of law affection, unite almost all of us:
I wish I could speak to animals. Today, a touch has left me with an alien in my chest. I would like to do maths, have my own tuition book, fill in the missing numbers. No one respects the rules of the game, so I don’t want to play anymore! Today, evening came, not with calm beauty but with the treat of violence. I won’t say all the truth, the truth has a limit, and above it, you can harm your own country. My country has seen a peace consummated by silence, but you know, I believe in smiles, I am a child, I possess unthinking obedience, and now, that a pulse has begun to beat on my brain, I have to say to you: the devil pays bad to whom serves him good. The outcome of self-observation is the gloomiest melancholia, so at the end of history, murder shall breed murder, always in the name of right and honor and peace until the Gods are tired of blood and create a race that can understand.
These words could cost me a bullet in the head. I talk to you about watermelon, money and America. Rules bore, I know, and ants can run, so where are the old men? I am not a big fat pig, I love mister gum. Irresponsible authority, men are so used to hearing divines preach one thing and practise another. Tempt of ambition. My brothers and sisters, if someone threw you a rope when you were drowning, if a doctor said take this because if you don’t you’ll die, you would, wouldn’t you? Very soon, I will completely die and all that will be left is my empty body walking with you. It will be quieter than I am. Humans fight for resources and ideas of resources. What if you were a great soldier – who made you so but God? Sit there in silence and be ruled by me, or all the Gods in Olympus will not be strong enough to keep me off and save you from my unconquerable hands.
If I had had to make choice of the place of my birth, I should have preferred a society which had an extent proportionate to the limits of the human faculties; that is, to the possibility of being well governed: in which every person being equal to his occupation, no one should be obliged to commit to others the functions with which he was entrusted: a State, in which all the individuals being well known to one another, neither the secret machinations of vice, nor the modesty of virtue should be able to escape the notice and judgment of the public; and in which the pleasant custom of seeing and knowing one another should make the love of country rather a love of the citizens than of its soil. I conjure you all to look into your hearts, and to hearken to the secret voice of conscience. I cannot recall to mind, without the sweetest emotions, the memory of that virtuous citizen, to whom I owe my being, and by whom I was often instructed, in this infancy, in the respect which is due to you, I have learned not to cry. And, if I have been so unhappy as to be guilty of any indiscreet transport in this glowing effusion of my heart, I beseech you to pardon me, and to attribute it to the tender affection of a true patriot, and to the ardent and legitimate zeal of a child, who can imagine for himself no greater felicity than to see you and himself happy. Today I weep for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart, and the fall through the air of the true. Now, the dogs are crying. Let our pretenders to taste admire elsewhere the grandeur of palaces, the beauty of equipages, sumptuous furniture, the pomp of public entertainments, and all the refinements of luxury and effeminacy. I am a child of violence, my pet has died, and now it smells like tuna. Troops: you may now applaud, from now on; sedition, violence and fighting are your breath of life. This may be a hunting game, you know: THEY ARE A PLAGUE TO DESTROY! So be prepared to give me a fresh prize, chosen to suit my taste and to make up for my loss, I have no more to say.
this political speech was arranged by claudia escobar. it has some of escobar's ideas combined with quotes and ideas from: the fitzroy community school children,the most dangerous animal by david livingstone, the discourse on the origin of inequality among men by rousseau, the iliad by homer, the lord of the flies by william golding, caesar and cleopatra by george bernard shaw, herbert fingarette's philosophy of self deception, the einstein-freud correspondence on why war?, a long way home by ishmael beah, 'you'll learn not to cry: child combatants in colombia' by human rights watch and mi confesion by carlos castaño.
