embodied politics
2/19/2024 disembodied (incalculable) self
embodied politics / disembodied self
78’840’000 miles traveled in rotation around the earth in 9 years
365,000’218 miles around the sun in 9 years
40,523,760,000 spiraled through the galaxy in 9 years
Approximately 40,888,760,218 miles my body (and yours) have moved through space since then, excluding the speed of our galaxy swimming through the larger cosmos (we didn’t calculate the miles traveled between countries, cities, towns, blocks, fields and empty lots - being a number immediately erased by any significant rounding
of up or
of down)
We use I, me, mine instead of we, us, ours to honor a self long dead, left (approx.) forty-trillion miles behind- I’m sure mistakes in the math were made, due to the imprecise stories we tell about time, human laziness (after a billion how do you measure the privilege or the personal gain?) and mostly because it doesn’t matter, except in stories where the sages settled on 10’000 for the number of the unknowable everything.
He always said when he got to our age
he would take up imaginary numbers and geometries
a universe defining occupation for retirement
although, after being fed body defying politics,
policies and propaganda for so long it's hard
for the him who has journeyed all-those-miles
to remember the smell of freshly turned earth as a
formula, or the flights of birds as a ratio
To test, I cite this: look!
Take an area of 141 square miles
how many murders constitutes
genocide? How many lies constitute truth?
After 1000 limbs removed
without anesthetic
Calculate diminishment in empathy what is the
S = P × R
(suffering equals pain multiplied by resistance)
when there is no R and all that is left is the S&P
I saw a picture of my daughter smiling toward
the camera a few feet away, .19 of a mile
four and a half years ago, or about
20,444,380,109 miles ago
and I remember my mother asking
around position 249,875,756,889 MP
(MP = Miles Past) “What happened
to your beautiful laugh?”
and despite, all those lonely cosmic ray infested
MPs I get it now
those eyes
that smile, cut away time, destroy distance
leaving, only a marvelous, warm sadness
Soon you’ll be asking me
(if I make it) what was it like
272,591,734,788.4667 miles back
All those we’ve left behind, all the vastness
we’ve traveled since, how the self is becoming
disembodied, increasingly limited, made into
a calculable finite, in order to fit
We’re certain, if you and me
and we
make it to mile:
454,319,557,980.7778 (454,319,557,981)
we’ll still need to
re-embody our politics
and let ourselves
remain
incalculable.
Much love,
Con/Jur/d, 2/19/2024
Well, sometimes I read something you write and I think that sure, others would enjoy it, but not in the way I do. This really moved me.
beautiful.