sad

how to write a eulogy

| ginger k. hintz

My stride is for life, a far place. —William Stafford, Run Before Dawn

South Dakota, March 2021

The first thing to know is everyone but you, and a few precious others, will move on. Push that reactionary and perceived disrespect to a corner in your heart you’ve saved for petty grievances. Forgive them, eventually, for they simply did not know your joy. You’ll be better served, in these early days, to center your scattered energy by paying attention to the way your days and weeks advance as you begin to revise your life. This or that part of your previous life is no longer applicable but you’ll still find yourself performing the phantom shapes of a visceral routine. The memories you form in this emerging now will feel like new bones growing, indescribable aches. When you notice you’re no longer performing for the past, breathe. In that space of awareness, allow laughter and evocations of pleasure to strengthen you. Remember, most of all, to praise the mutual life you were able to create together.

Repeat.

Repeat.

The next number of infinite steps is to continue gathering the integrity of love.

 

fractals

| ginger k. hintz

I. Writing; an act of stroking paper.

4 October 2018, Oakland, CA

II. The aggressiveness of buying and selling resistance, as seen on TV, makes me wanna disassociate.

self-portrait in Wave by Pirkle Jones, 1952, gelatin silver print [Oakland Museum of California]

III. Competitions of sadness are trauma tiers.

PUBLIC NOTICE, 14 September 2018, Oakland, CA

IV. It’s ok that I don’t fit in she says.

27 April 2018, San Francisco, CA

V. If I write a word today, just one, that must be enough.

shallows

| ginger k. hintz
Martin Wittfooth, The Ecstasy

all this absence, in the space of starting over, forms my backbone
i wish i could claim something useful here, like emotional resilience
or self-efficacy managed beyond the flutter of obscene distractions

structurally, skin has the capacity to absorb 1000 strikes soft as fur
before bruising, blue then purple then finally breaking open red
bold as light leaks found in the silenced literacy of family photos

this spread of truth tight and shallow in surrendering

post-truth

| ginger k. hintz

Did our information channels cross? What did you see?

Detroit Nov16
Detroit Nov16

I saw acceptance as evolution or, for some, defeat.
Our blended memories equal parts resistance.
These metaphors really are literal representations.

Over strong coffee and homemade kuchen he said,
America does not have a culture of grief.
For some, this is our language, stories, solutions.

There is nothing in this city that is soft.
Nothing but words that flow from behind your teeth
and the background rhythm of your always working heart.

Working all sides of the angle honors a process.
All conversations end unless you want to move forward.
Value silence found around figurative positions.

The screen read: baptized by boundaries.
I looked for dignity after that simple interaction.
Theories, as perception, in parsimony and in exhale.

with(out) you

| ginger k. hintz
artist: Kourtney Roy
artist: Kourtney Roy

underneath the ocean
a quiet roars

we all have an edge
soft margins with sharp centers
fiercely contoured boundaries

we sanction ourselves
we insist love is provocative
as we make our homes museums

every day and every night a tender eve
books left marked to forever hold place

let go

| ginger k. hintz

Let every kiss hit the body / like a season.
—Ocean Vuong, A Little Closer to the Edge

artist: Mary Abbott
artist: Mary Abbott

cloud covers become sun patterns
we react as resistance—
malefic masculinity—and are born again
in times of violence
flash moments designed as destiny
patterns worn translucent
soft and hard (but never loose)
when the middle shifts
the center sways—inertia