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chain dialogue: happiness
The
very first issue of Chain began with a series of chain
letters. We asked artists and writers to write something, send
it on to someone else, and then for that person to write something
in response and send both pieces on to someone else, etc.
In
the spirit of that procedure, I started a chain around the word
“happiness.” The Declaration of Independence says: “We
hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created
equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable
Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of
Happiness...” This past summer I was visited by a friend
who has lived in Moscow for many years. During the course of a
conversation he exclaimed that he couldn’t see anything wrong
with an ideology (capitalism) that was based on the idea that
all people should have the right to make themselves happy. I instantly
started to argue . . . and began to think about what this “happiness”
is that we have the right to. (JO)
Stacy
Doris
A Text of Happiness
Sun.
Strong sun, but almost any sun.
Sun in winter, surpassing heat even. Inside or out.
Sun exposing particles and dust and imperfection to the point of
perfection; to vertigo.
Sun on certain oily skin bringing its liquids to surface.
Seeing someone sleep and thinking it is peacefully.
Almost any reflection of light.
Water, including its infinite sounds, textures, and
temperatures.
The impression of understanding almost anything.
The impression of understanding almost anything that is written.
The impression of comprehending almost anything that is
written in Arabic or Greek. The figure eight.
The
feeling of understanding physics just by observing, and of writing
that down, but fleeting. The feeling of really paying or having
paid attention, albeit fleeting.
The feeling of some sort of inclusiveness or inclusion, then.
That leaving out is one of inclusiveness’ forms.
Your voice.
Suddenly, not too nervous.
Almost
any reflection of water; almost any reflection of light on almost
any water.
Being, such as swimming, in not too warm water, in Aegean water,
its green, and the water is a mirror of infinity, and then comes
the impression of being a particle adrift in endless space, and
accepting that; in short: being. So being dead and alive at once,
suspended.
Almost any moment of purely being, as above.
Swimming preferably in the Aegean, not too warm, seeing cliffs on
the island, and my eye somehow splits the surface of the water,
so I watch its wavy mass while moving through it, while seeing Chet’s
legs kick not far off. Therefore knowing fear’s absence.
Almost
any red, including orange.
Certain orange fruits, including perfect persimmons.
View.
A really good view.
A really good view, and living in it.
Almost
any clouds, in a great view or outside.
Very big puffy white clouds against certain November night skies,
over the Seine, seen from on or near the bridges, when the day was
darker.
The
idea of birds but not birds per se. Same with flight.
An
alternance of brilliance and murkiness which is not light and dark.
If we can revel in missing ingredients, in what is not here, in
what’s forgotten; in mistakes, as if in loss.
And orgasm being beyond happiness.
Projection.
Projection, which is made of light and air and water, or a really
good movie, like Niagara falls.
Projection, for example breathing in and out at once.
Projection, such that birth and death are suspended; silenced in
its clap.
Projection which rejoices in a future, such as travel anywhere,
which may include swimming in the Aegean again, which must mean
strength, or living somewhere light-drenched, or Chet brushing the
unborn child’s hair. Rejoicing in almost any future. Which
is strength.
Clean
sheets every day.
Certain
more oily types of skin, and pressing against an oily back, nakedly.
The presence of certain oily skin of African men, women and children
which has stored the sun in a way that radiates a feeling of goodness
or deepest comfort. The presence of certain other skin which manages
to also.
Certain smiles of African men, women and children, and certain other
smiles which manage to also.
Projection
circuiting back to almost any moment of purely being.
As flooding.
A feeling of being as part of every noise.
A feeling as being part of light, its waves, and fire.
A feeling of being able to give directly, or even indirectly, to
give all and that it is received.
And so a feeling of being as giving, which is being.
That
love, including our love, can exceed us and thus time. That our
creations and imaginations, which may be at best love, can too then.
If
someone read it, and it seems to have touched her.
When
Chet is heard coming down the hall, and then comes through the door
and looks happy.
When Chet is asleep and thinking it is peacefully.
When Chet does not want to wake up, but with good nature.
Certain hot chocolate, from Angelina’s or Christian Constant.
Certain grapefruits.
Certain matcha tea, in any form, but strong.
That green.
Bahaa Abu Daya
When Salt Blooms
It
was a dark discussion as the dark of the room we were talking about
the situation in Gaza with a lot of cigarettes and drinks we were
tired of that it is the same words every day nothing new.
Ross and me two artists two words two hopes and two negative ideas
about the situation in Gaza and Palestine.
When the salt blooms. I said
it is the title of my exhibit he said
the title refers to a particularly bleak period within the last
9 months since the Intifada started
just one of many phrases concerning something
that will never happen.
We were sad and happy at the same time for the title
it will never happen.
But the show will go
as the life in this city will go
as the same sun and smile
but something will change I said.
It
was a lovely evening and a sad atmosphere.
Maybe they will bomb tonight or maybe not
that was what every face told at the opening evening of the exhibition.
Only
she who has a different face
with a smile and hope
she came from the West Bank to say
congratulations and to say that salt
can bloom
she gave him a vase full of salt and
flowers they were blooming
he is so happy it can be possible
she made it to say yes it is possible
everybody got a different vision of the situation
because
of the flowers
it
was happy as the happiness of the flowers.
Beth
Yahp
The Pursuit of Happiness
1.
Yours (or mine)
Happy is inside, in the globular warmth of cupped hands, slippery
as a newborn, and as new. She holds Happy with care, with determination,
and with awe. Runs down the narrow pathways of the squatter village,
lolloping in a red dress and oversized slippers, leaping mounds
and runnels, the cracked lip of a monsoon drain. She grazes the
outraged ears of an alleycat, its tail stiff and flicking, she soars
that sure-footed, that quick. Happy’s heart beats in the cave
of her hands, not too strongly, but with determination, urging her
onwards. Happy as an old woman’s eyes, just waking. Her cough
racked with rainbows. Sunlight reflecting on cut glass. A rainbow
tinged smile. Not far away, but faraway enough behind her, a kind
of yowling, hideous, bereft, begins. Happy’s heart beats.
2.
Hers (or theirs)
Happy is as happy does. In this case, with a can of condensed milk,
the label torn, the can itself rusty, but once pierced, yielding
its sticky yellow to be licked at, slowly, lusciously, from a forefinger.
Just as it should. Sweet explosive with eyes closed, making it last.
There’s not a pipsqueak raised amongst them, her children,
dirty elbows propped around the kitchen table. She lets them wait.
Dry crackers set on squares of newspaper, since the last dish yielded
to its last crack across her elbow last night. The last insult staggered
out the front door. Not a whine or snivel this morning, which in
itself is news. No more tears. A shadow flashes past the window,
the after-image of a girl tearing down the pathway, hair flying.
A red flicker in the corner of her eye. None of the children moves.
Their eyes fastened to sweet anticipation of Happy, dripping down
the sides of her finger and more intriguing to them than the blue-black
blooming on her cheekbone, the hairless swelling behind her ear.
She holds Happy up to them like a lamp, like the clear light of
morning, and herself in its yellow glow, exposed as a stone goddess
at an exhibition. Faces upturned towards her. Exhibit A. She smiles
at them, radiant.
3.
His (or theirs)
His Happy is huge, is white vapourous, billowing, cushions him in
mother’s milk, in wholeness. Albumen. In a him with him-and-a-half
to spare. He stands swaying on the steps of the toddy shop while
Happy expands out into the morning, up the pathway, up through the
coconut palm fronds, up over the heads of village people, and over
the housing estate beyond. The faces of housing estate people upturned
towards him, at the gates of terrace houses, corner bungalows, the
wheels of shiny cars. He jingles some leftover coins in his pocket,
pricks a finger on a shard of glass. The children’s money jar
shattering as easily as dry crackers last night, as a nightdress
standing in Happy’s way. Arms raised in protest. An open mouth.
A fist. Yesterday’s shrivelled face loses itself in the clear
light of morning, yesterday’s gate slammed and wages withheld
to pay for broken tools. His hands tremble. Idiot! Shit for brains!
Yesterday’s face lost in tools slipping shivery from them.
He steps down to the pathway. Feels a sudden stillness, then a breeze,
and a red dress flapping. Disappearing around a corner. A sudden
wild smell. And he stands there swaying, breathing. And is spun
in a rush to right and left of him, and shouts and rough hands shoving
him aside. He spins, and then stands breathing, expanding. For this
morning his Happy is huge. No one can touch him, or pull him earthwards.
Cut him to size.
4.
Mine (or yours)
Happy has a sweet taste in the mouth, like the return of good fortune.
It has grace and functionality, ticks quietly in time, cogs and
wheels invisibly turning. Like the inner workings of a watch, the
one she gazes at absently, for example, lifting one delicate wrist.
Shaking it gently. It trembles. She sits gazing amidst grace and
functionality in a long cool room, in a corner bungalow with two
alsatians and iron-spiked walls, where everything rests in harmony
and balance. Just so. She has that kind of sensibility, that eye.
She looks east, where the sun rises, never west, where the squatter
village spills disorderly towards her front gate. Comes begging
and calling. Old clothes, odd jobs, ironing, Madam? Everything around
her, including Happy, has its place. Each object in the room, each
vase, sculpture, carpet, rocking chair, lace maccasar, is an extension
of her eye. Which, this morning, unbalanced, offends her. More than
ingratitude, or mismatched breakfast cups, or an overbrewed pot
of tea. Stupid girl. Madam can’t drink that. More than last
night’s absence, yet again, out entertaining clients all night,
or this morning’s absence, gone to the office directly, early
morning meeting. Yet again. Sorry, dear. The indignity of an undisturbed
bed. This morning Happy is outside, reflecting rainbows, and in
its place, like some sick joke on a rosewood stand, nestles a brown
hen’s egg. In place of crystal. So she has to avert her head.
When they finally drag the girl in the red dress in, switching the
bamboo cane about her legs so she dances, begging and calling, Happy
has a sweet taste. She can’t help herself, tasting it. She
holds herself perfectly still.
Adam Aitken
Federation, Mark 2
One hundred
years, and I am not as I was
things are better now, you will agree
motto on an old school badge:
the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness
or our folksy versions:
“i am and i want” in Australian Latin of course—
i want what I am . . . or words like that
and
I can’t think of a nation
so anxious to be happy
singing ourselves this structured refrain
each
year
a motto
each year
a tango competition
that charges double
for the Portaloo amenities in Olympic park I guess.
At
least
the nomads like walking
the rabbit fence again,
and what our terrible cruelty
did to them—taking their kids away
becomes a complex of happiness
mixed with the guilt some of us feel
but mostly I drive
from meeting to meeting,
trading messages and recordings
like boomerangs coming back
as petrol
as a promise
to meet and talk
dreaming perhaps
the many true stories
Federation
refers to Australia’s founding as a (white) nation. Mark
2 refers to our recent Centenary celebration of this event.
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