I’m asked to write an essay about my relation to attention. I insert the word dissociate. An editor encourages me to describe it physically, a consolation to his worry my usage treats “an extraordinary occurrence” as a “matter of course.” I try to imagine, albeit briefly, a life in which my brain would feel safe enough to remain stationed. This is, in itself, a kind of dissociation—a departure from the moment at hand when the present offers a sensation beyond the brain’s capacity.
Some days later, I am compelled
to negotiate dissociation
on the page.
It is an imperfect problem. In order to effectively chart it, one would have to interject the unwanted and unpredictable static that causes it—a particular combination of sounds in a chamber boomeranging against cement instead of cushions; an interaction (read: person) with an undefinable list of attributes socially insistent, so many words with no blank in between, a facial confrontation that requires a constant cascade of masks you hope you’ve built in your closet of skins (to name a few)—it is not enough to display the archive, for that includes a certainty that doesn’t apply.
you out of it, guaiguai? (laughing)
are you even paying attention to me
(at the bookfair) i felt you didn’t care to talk to me or forgot me
i’m boring you aren’t i you can tell me
where are you (snapping)
where are you (waving)
it’s fine i can tell you aren’t here
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Li-Young Lee says in a workshop
the speaker is using artifice to distract
from what is too
catastrophic
to address
directly
………………………………………
when the border between
wholeness & dust
pervades
my brain hurtling through time
steel tube suspended in air
but going nowhere
as far as I know
between presence & absence
held captive
if my head is O and my hand is [
[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O[O
the question,
what does [dissociating] feel like
is a
bubble
i try to catch it but each time i try
it pops and pops and pops and pops
the definition a mental process of disconnecting from one’s
thoughts, feelings, memories or sense of identity
asserts an agency
where there is none
no metaphor is sufficient because a metaphor roots one in the physical world
when one
only feels absent
from the body
but you see
what i did
there
the metaphor an anchor
where
none
is
found