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  • 65
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Lafayette Wattles & Meg Willing

2/10/2018

 
Made in a Trailer Park

I remember the broken years you lived
in that rumpled land submarine
someone else had run aground at the park
behind the drive-in. The faded
green trim. The once upon a time
white, a wind-buffed shade of bone.

I remember how we would make up
stories of all the lives given to it, lost
to it, as if that dented trailer
were a ship night-mangled on a reef
of failed dreams, again and again,
over the years before you and your mom
pieced it together for your own doomed
voyage, which seemed destined
to leave you stranded there.

I remember the way your mom rigged
up that shower out back. Those three shivery
buckets. The way you squealed
from the cold, even in summertime.

I remember the way she would rinse
between double features. The glow
from the giant screen filtered
through the two small windows
of your home, brightening her shoulders
as if she did have stardust,
as if she might have been
a washed up, washed out, shooting star.

I remember all those movies.
The hollow sound of the tin roof
beneath our feet as if the world might
swallow us whole. The day
that hail storm pinned you
down for hours, as if trying
to break through, trying to break you.

I remember how you swore
you’d get out. You’d wash your hands
of that place, of that life.

Here it is all these years later,
someone else catching sight of you
from that not quite collapsed abode.
A girl, maybe, on the one-eared
rocking horse you left behind,
corralled in the stony yard. A mom,
or dad, or aunt, maybe, looking up
from a feeble kitchen chair
plunked by the new water hookup,
watching your massive face,
that long ago ache in your eyes
something you have turned to gold.
No one even noticing the rotted corner
of the big screen. Peeling layers of paint.

All they see is the tear you have trained
to run down your right cheek. As if
you have channeled some part of you
that never got out, that never truly got away.


​by Lafayette Wattles

Video by Meg Willing

Sophia McMaster & Chris Walters

1/15/2018

 
If I had ever thought of the challenges of middle school, the problem I faced would have never come to mind. My first period class, including me, had been informed of the school writing contest. This was a chance to show your true talent. Our quirky English teacher had told our class, hoping to resurrect our dead spirits towards the assignment. I was hooked at the idea, for writing stories is one of my great pastimes. But, for once, I felt as if I was trying to bake a cake with no ingredients. I didn’t know how to start my story.
    To avoid my constant habit of procrastination, I decided to take a short walk down the hallway. As I entered the long corridor, I was greeted by the brisk, glacier-like air clearing my mind. In a serene state, I stretched out my hand to the paper-white brick wall. It was as if my hand was an oar and my body was a boat, sailing through an ocean of air. Could I possibly be entering a state of enlightenment and inspiration?
    Nearing the end of the corridor, I felt my hand brush over something rough. The texture was drastically different from the smooth surface of the wall. The wood-like area of the wall was an indent in the hallway, making up a mere tier in an unknown cake of wall. I was surprised that I had never noticed this disembodiment while transporting myself through the corridor.
    Moving my hand in several full revolutions, I came to discover that the region I was touching moved slightly at its top. This must be a door, I thought to myself. The door must have a purpose, but what was it? Thoughts of childish excitement bombarded into my head like an extra neutron in an uranium atom. This nuclear fission overcame me. Could it be a pipeline of ductwork that led to every classroom in the building? Or was it a portal to another dimension with rainbows and unicorns and clouds made of fluffy cotton candy?
    Filled with curiosity, I got on my hands and knees, while I prepared to open the door knowing whatever lay behind it would amaze me. Checking the hallway to see if anyone was occupying the space, I decided to proceed, pass go, and collect two-hundred dollars. Well, maybe not the two-hundred dollars part, but something amazing, I hoped.
    I gave a gentle push on the door. The small board moved through the air like a stealth boat on dead calm water. I crawled through the small entrance, greeted by a dimly-lit room. The motion-sensor light illuminated a small portion of the room, the rest of the space was coated in inky shadows. Taking up the rest of the space were large articles. There were two chairs upside-down that were placed atop a small wooden table. On the other side of the rectangular room, a shower stall and a pinball machine lined the wall. Looking back on that day, I never truly understood how I found a storage closet so intriguing.
    Thinking of nothing better to do, I took down one of the chairs from the top of the table and sat in it. The cold, firm plastic sent a tickle up my spine. As my awe for the room had floated away like the graceful smoke of an extinguished candle, the thought of the story competition struck me like a snake in the grass. What was I going to do? I pondered over the issues to what felt like a great amount of time. I took a second glance at the articles in the room and several ideas came into my mind.
Hmmm… I thought looking at the old, tired pinball machine. Maybe I could enter a story about a man named Ramon and how he met a girl, Stella, at an arcade or a casino, or any place that adults go to have fun. Or, peering at the shower stall, I could write about a naked lady who was murdered in her own bathtub. No, that wouldn’t work, I realized. It sounds like one of the boys in my class would say that to annoy the girls. Could I write about one of my adventures? None of these ideas seemed to work at all.
Standing up from sitting at the table, I felt my chocolate wavy hair fall over my shoulders like a waterfall. Then, all of the sudden, I realized something important.
Inspiration can come from you inside, not just what you see in the world. With this wisdom, I knew my story that I was going to write would be great.



by Sophia McMaster

Picture
Photograph & installation by Chris Walters

    66 OURS - Collaborative Writing Project

    Starting with Phase 1, writers had 66 days to base their writing on 1 anonymous person & 1 vignette, dutifully and judiciously assigned to each writer by Amelia.

    For Phase 2, Amelia then took said writings and paired them with artists who then have 66 days to translate the words into physical form, either with creations or performance.

    Then the works and secrets were revealed June 22nd through June 24th 
    at 
    Beulahland.

    Photos given to the writers

    Each writer was given a combination of 1 person + 1 vignette from the following:
    Picture
    Person 1
    Picture
    Person 2
    Picture
    Person 3
    Picture
    Vignette 1
    Picture
    Vignette 2
    Picture
    Vignette 3

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