Where is the poetry supporting animals rights? - Christine Townend*

7/7/2013

1 Comment

 
Meera Atkinson

* This is the first of a series of responses to conference papers, which will be announced by the title and author of the paper. The idea is not to proffer works of literary genius set to last the test of time, but rather to fling forth first drafts of writerly, experiential reflections as promptly as possible. Feel free to use these as launching pads for further discussion around the paper or reflections of your own. 

If I speak you
how to speak you
not just of you
or speak at you
or around you
what we found you
or surround you
or defend you
or pretend you
or explain you
how to speak you
your unique you
smelling through you
see as you do
hear what you hear
fear what you fear
rear as you rear
give as you give
live as you live
cry as you cry
die as you die
if I speak you
speak your story
of your glory
through our sameness
and our difference
at resistance
if I speak
I speak through me
you me you me you me you me
then I speak
with the air of shared breath

1 Comment
A. Marie
7/10/2013 03:38:38 pm

Much echoing in this poem from the panel discussion. Indeed, Christine very powerfully noted that July 7 was the anniversary of the Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness -- I had to stop and reflect on that for a moment -- very profound. As I said in my panel presentation and response to the Declaration, attending to difference is as important as finding points of comparison. Difference and sameness, going back to Derrida... Another footnote: I was channeling J.M. Coetzee's David Lurie (_Disgrace_) when I talked about "smelling through" nonhuman animals. (Smelling/through is key to theoretical work I'm doing on representations of nonhuman animals in literature; I had hoped to link to a presentation I did last month, but I been notified that it didn't record.)

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