Invitation
By Victoria Alondra
Riot
Stifled screams metamorphose
into paper and pen. Riots
against cages. We rupture
agony through sentence. Tear apart
metal and metaphor. We are
breaking
free
A brightly lit, windowfront studio on Gap Road is an invitation to witness the subversive relations and intimate universes that exist within and in spite of the current political and social dynamics of Mparntwe (Alice Springs) and the wider colony that is Australia. My infant daughter tugs at my face and coos, declaring that she’s ready for a snooze. As she is soothed to sleep, I wonder about the boundless micro-resistances that take place every day on this street but are overshadowed by a narrative of fear, dismay and hatred. How many people are robbed of bearing witness to the moments of joy, connection and survival that draw breath beyond the asphyxiation of ‘race’ and other identity labels? My gaze turns to the street. A group of teenagers roar laughter as they walk past. Old friends embrace each other and grieve the loss of a loved one. A toddler chases a butterfly. Gap Road buzzes with life as my daughter sleeps in sunbathed silence in her makeshift bed.
Figure 1 - A white cloud hovers over Gap Road, Arrernte Country
Musing about this residency has been difficult, largely because artistic expression is a consequence of my life rather than a choice. Poetry emerged as a language of life and as catharsis in the face of swelling fascism and looming climate catastrophes. Existence is a fraught, tender thing.
“Can the hungry go on a hunger strike? Non-violence is a piece of theatre. You need an audience. What can you do when you have no audience? People have the right to resist annihilation." – Arundhati Roy.
Witnessing is an exercise of empathy and dissolving power dynamics through the creation of shared experiences. Where power exists, I believe that invitation is what bridges the difference between cold observation and solidarity. Not every story is ours to know.
Figure 2 - A desert full moon is positioned behind young trees, surrounded by a purple sky
Poetry was a sanctuary away from the social service sector that tested my ethics by pushing me to collude with policing and child prisons at the expense of communities. Privileged workers, even the good ones, are always afforded the luxury of returning to their lives. The job – along with any repercussions of their decisions – is left at the door when they exit the building, competing for oxygen. Suffocating spaces have created tension between my voice and safety, often coercing me into choosing silence as a means of survival. Shame and cowardice follow silence like a shadow. Loneliness, a natural consequence of being surrounded by cold observers in both personal and (so-called) professional spaces. I became a shell of myself: quiet and aloof as I also dealt with losing thirteen loved ones within a year. Cumulative sorrow chipped away at my heart until it became a pile of shattered glass in my chest, and hope, a jester that mocked reality.
Monetising Oppression
Despotism wrings our kin
withered. Blood churned into
currency by ostiaries in the name
of profession. Degrees.
A dialogue depraved, whispered
in a language that pretends
to be melody while stifling our screams
in the abyss of policy and politics.
Sector employment a velvet slipper
for pale feet office perks aeroplane
vacations. A noose
slipped over a child's brown neck.
Altered to the cellular level, thousands of memories swarmed and revealed themselves not as memories but as parallel worlds existing in synchronicity. This month has been a visceral exercise of space/time-travel through the vast universe that is my body. Somatic poetics gifted moments of power where experiences were re-storied away from narratives that make memory out of living being. Time is not linear – a concept that challenges my Western indoctrination.
Picking joyful memories like wild roses, I bring them to my family for us to enjoy. The celestial aroma draws out the grief we’ve shared over the stoic resignations of our communities when forced into corners with no passage out. We now build escape tunnels everywhere, rejoicing over the tales of valiant joy and defiance that were never witnessed. In this re-write, our collective grief overcomes inertia and furiously catapults toward emancipation at the speed of dripping honey.
I am – we are – mosaics of the consequences of modern life and ancestral blood memory. My heart bursts into butterflies at the thought of this cosmic synchronicity. Worlds of possibility unfurl before me, wild and full of colour.
Figure 3 - A rainbow and a stormy sunset make magic over Arrernte Country
Marigolds
Eruptions
of a future yet
to arrive. We chase
freedom like sunflowers
follow the sun.
Ignore
obituaries
that gather like moths to light. Fluttering
before falling
into memory.
Our pain
a portal
to anotherworldy future
where obituaries are flowers
blooming story from death
leaving behind
marigold fields
There are universes where colonialism never occurred and my loved ones are alive. This is where I choose to exist, without negating the darkness of a reality that tries to suffocate us at every turn. This is my resistance. If I am here, it is to be joyful. It is to love and to create spaces that are medicine and healing. Our ancestors are our guides, walking alongside us and inviting us to create the worlds they dreamed we would: full of ineffable joy. Sometimes, that joy looks like a toddler chasing a butterfly on Gap Road under the desert sun.