Tim, Lydia et. al.:
I'm taken with your inquiry into male privilege via the "duality
stems from very deep substructures of human consciousness."
Speaking of sub-structures... here's my poetic attempt to examine
separatism, chauvinist pigs and vestigial religions at an atomic level (I
was reading Paul G. Hewitt's _Conceptual Physics_ at the same time as the
Gospel of Mark).
So that you don't think I always think binaries dissolve in single breath, I
include a second poem that examines heirarchies. (It responds two books:
Heinrich, Bernd. _Ravens In Winter._ New York: Vintage, 1989.
Hopkins, Sarah Winnemucca. _Life Among the Piutes._ Reno: U of Nevada P, 1994.)
Those on this listserve who are not shocked when "some poem" starts a flurry
of conversation might enjoy the recently releashed _Ecofeminist Literary
Criticism: Theory, Interpretation, Pedagogy_ edited by Greta Gaard and
Patrick D. Murphy (U of Illinois Press).
_____________________
THE ATOMIC NATURE OF MA
Figure 9.1: girl model with model molecule
she is made of stardust
the carbon, the oxygen
the other atoms that make her
body originated in the deep
interior of ancient stars
long since exploded
you are she in me
for each breath you offer
every person worldwide takes
one of your exhaled atoms
we are breathing each other
many atoms in my lungs
were once in your lungs -
the lungs of every person
who ever lived we are
the same atoms we borrow
by breath by sweat
your grandmother's last breath
is Adam in my belly
take him from me this Eve
mount me, mouth me
until I have your graddaughter's
first exhale left in my right lung
figure 15:13: sleeping pigs side by side
pigs have no sweat
cannot cool by vapor
they wallow in mud
hog breath rises rises
expands chills coalesces
chance collisions we
fly through their cloud
we rut they rut like dogs
each intake we be swine
your grandma's consort
is a boar in my blood
make her from me love
mount me, mouth me
Mark 5: 1-13 man from the tombs with an unclean spirit
he hand often been bound
no one was strong enough now
his shackles broken in pieces
by night he gnashed himself
with stones implored God
the Adam-in-him already
within our Jesus asked
his name: my name
is Legion for we are many
with one breath of the Lord
unclean spirits entered swine
two thousand rushed a cliff
drowned in that very sea
the sea that clouds our exhale
for each breath we hold
that very man from the tombs
who breathes one of our souls
life lunges toward the unclean
Legions' atoms in our lungs
like Jonah in a whale's belly
ride the tide of conversion
figure 10.6 the stretch of the spring
an object subject
to deforming forces
undergoes change
depending on bonds
the order of atoms
if molecular vibes increase
molecules will shake apart
will wander taking shape
ordered by their container
each atom rises rises
expands chills coalesces
chance collisions we
were all hog breath
in the six hundredth day
of Noah's life we were
all fountain all ark
vapors of the great deep
burst open we are every
beast and every creeping
thing we are two of all
flesh which was each breath
Lori Anderson
_____________________
WHY HUMANS SHARE (MY BOOK REPORTS)
1. Thanksgiving
On page 95, he examines 50 pounds of not-yet-foul beef he put out last dusk.
It is Thanksgiving. A year later to the date, on page 166, he hauls 500
pounds of butchered dairy cows plus a 120-pound calf to test the nature of
bait and the order of discovery. On page 43, his truest day of giving
thanks, his presence scatters ravens feasting on a poacher's unintentional
offering. The meat is fresh. He removes the moose's hide, cuts a chunk of
meat roasts it, then rests in reverie, recounting the "quorks," "quarks" and
"queeks" of the recruitment hymn that called him to this carcass.
Why do birds share food? He wants to know not by mere impression but by
tedious observation. By 74, his "offering" is two cut-open Holstein calves.
Cautious, a crow pair visits 17 times to cache. Ignore that. He is not
interested in them. He wants a raven performing a "jumping jack" to test the
bait - "to differentiate the living from the dead." How easily evidence
slips (datum to question to projection). Though tentative, his desires
complicate ravens. On page 76, at 12:05, the eating starts. One sentence
later, at 1:45 p.m., the feeding frenzy is over.
Birds disperse. His book gathers. "These relationships between distribution
of food and roosts probably also explain the seemingly different social
systems reported by European workers, principally in Switzerland. The
European workers worked at large permanent dumps, and most likely there were
fewer carcasses available in the forests for alternative food " (page 177).
>From patterns, he postulates: individuals who receive the least food
("subordinates?" he asks) are the most likely to move on. Likewise, take out
of context, he is exploited to meet my needs.
2. Famine
On page 91, each of the 900 held captive at Camp McDermitt was give a pound
and half of meat. By page 141, rations are withheld - her tribe's fate
predictable even to her first readers. The moment whites used to assuage
their guilt predates covered wagons; we see her redress on 74 as confession:
"My people say the tribe we exterminated had red hair�. I have a dress which
has been in our family for a great many years, trimmed with this reddish
hair. I am going to wear it sometime when I lecture." In the same watershed
where the Donner Party will later learn to be donors, her people herded a
tribe they feared (those "who spoke the same language" but would not "be
like us and not eat people like coyotes or beasts") into the mouth of the
cave. Then her people fed the cave fire.
What will humans share? She wants to know not merely by continual giving
but by refusing to take. Late in the book, she refuses "firewater" the
Calvary offers instead of food. Early in the book, having been buried alive
by her mother who knowingly chants: "we will all be killed and eaten up,"
she refuses gifts from the whites her grandfather "loved so much." White
bread, sugar, a red calico dress, a tin cup, attempted rape, a catholic
education � all came her way because her grandfather, Chief Truckee, killed
Mexicans with Freemont. The power of a single battle's allegiance wanes as
the number of soldiers increase. To test the new army's bait, to
differentiate gifts from betrayal, takes her the entire book. But the whole
story is told when the Humboldt River first sours on page 41. We will all
die of poison thirst. We will all kill by association.
Lori Anderson
I want to add a third section to the last poem that examines a book on how
the human body distributes oxygen to its many parts and/or how the liver
discerns and eliminates toxins. Any recommendations? Or is it always suspect
(adaptive fallacy) to link the structure of biological systems to social
organization?
At 11:08 AM 8/28/98 -0600, you wrote:
>Thanks Tim,
>
>For starting out the discussion. I feel it is worthwhile to clarify
>that when I discusses the unconscious, unacknowledged characteristics
>of male priviledge, I am not wishing to demonize males, or widen the
>schism that may exist between men and women. Rather the whole matter
>really fascinates me because I'm coming to think that the duality
>stems from very deep substructures of human consciousness--
>
>where early human females maintained a sense of identity
>and community via the mother/child diad, with other females.
>Fatherhood as a cultural attribute was unknown. But when males and
>females began to form a newer family unit, males cultivated identity
>by asserting their prowess and desirability through showing their
>abilities at provisioning -- the male/female assymetry includes Being
>(female) and Doing (male) or communion vs action.....
>
>As we all pretty much agree, an imbalance and heirarchy of these
>energies has occured which is very much part of the headlong
>distruction of our earthly home, and basis for much evil/ignorant
>behavior among humans.
>
>What interests me is, how would culture evolve if competition and the
>urge for domination were somehow erased. How would we spend our time
>if we were not out there trying to get ahead of the other guy, or
>acquiring as much stuff as possible, or showing how we're alittle
>bit smarter or more able than the other guy. Much of our cultural
>evolution to date has resulted from the subject/object duality, from
>a profound urge for differentiation which has also come to imply
>control and domination.
>
>I read somewhere recently of a survey of children (say third graders)
>where they were asked "How would you feel if you were suddenly
>changed from a girl to boy, or vice versa." Girls talked of
>increased freedom, more opportunities, etc. Boys often said they'd
>want to kill themselves if that happened. These biases run deep and
>wide.
>
>I try to envision a world where we were not so invested in heirarchy
>and competition....Even I feel, at a gut level that this kind of
>world would seem somehow bland and uninteresting.
>
>
>Other opinions?
>
>Lydia
>Linda Littrell
>Applied Economoics
>University of Minnesota
>612/625-1762
>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
