madame zenobia's

i went to the gym today and saw the same women that i blogged about a few days ago. of course that got me to thinking about the same stuff i generally thinking about when i'm working out--body image, the gaze, self-acceptance, etc. here lately, my gym visits haven't been very satisfying. i think i've hit that work-out plateau because nothing seems to work. but who knows? i also have a warped body image so it is very difficult for me to see past me. as i transitioned from legs to arms (i hate doing arms...), i started thinking about--of all things--theory. i spend a lot of time talking with other folks about theory, theory making, theory doing, theory something else. theory, theory, theory...

what does theory mean to the lives of people not in the academy? like what does the theory of intersectionality mean to the woman i see in the gym all the time? or what do theories about language and power mean to people who are forced to send their children to sub-standard public schools? what does critical race theory mean for every raced body? what does queer theory mean for not queer people who can get married or adopt or live/love without fear?

whatever i do in this field, i don't want my thinking, theorizing, and teaching to remain on the campus. this "feminism and war" conference seems to be trying to do that type of work. it seems to me that that's what we should all aim for...we need to tear the ivory tower down...angela says that "politics do not stand in polar opposition to our lives. whether we desire it or not, they permeate our existence, insinuating themselves into the most private spaces of our lives." i say that we should expect, in fact demand, that of theory.

poem of the day

"bus stop blues"
me

There is enough light in a gray sky
To dilate pupils
Brown irises adjust and focus
On a bus schedule
She calculates the minutes she’ll have for her poetry
When conversations about
Minutes left on her cell phone
Are no longer the difference between the minutes until the strip is pink
And the minutes until the bank opens
Are shorter than the minutes until her name is called
But are not as long as those minutes spent waiting for blood-test results
In contrast to the too-short minutes between the first slap and the second punch

She waits for the 45th second and wishes for the 55th because that’ll mean
Less minutes at the bus stop
At the intersection of West Genny and Salina
Fiberglass menageries with contents on display
The cases sit on all compass points—north and south; east and west
Allowing suburb dwellers and city escapees to view and pity
And be thankful that the buses don’t run that far down Salina

Bus 42 lumbers past
Discarded Dunkin Donut cups and finished newspapers dance in the bus’s wake
Her bags rustle and the plastic touches her left calf
Thick and strong from walking to and from the bus stop
Sinewy muscles are covered by dry, cracked skin exposed to lake-effect winters
She stopped spending $4 a tube for cocoa butter long ago
Because it does nothing to stop her nails from turning Clorox yellow
And did not mask the smell of Pine-sol
It can, claims the fair-skinned lady on the box, even out skin tone
But nobody cares about that at the bus stop
Nobody looks down at flesh peeking out of a black skirt framing a white apron
She decided to save the $4 and schedule a manicure

The sky looks like a sheet of butcher paper
Stretched across the meat counter
Wax coating lets animal blood
Gather in perfect droplets
Polka dots on a slick surface
She hurries home to cook the strip steak that she bought on sale
And dream of her poetry while minute rice steams