Warren and I have been quietly working in our cave of a kiln. We find we have a personal language we use when referring to pots. So we ask each other, “please pass me the boat, or the fish tail, or the trumpet.” Our verbal shorthand becomes a poetic language. We photograph our progress in stacking, but I realize all the ways it does not capture the rhythm of choices, the things we have learned, or the mistakes we might be making.
The poem that follows is based on a series of photos taken by the photographer Carrie Mae Weems. I found it is best when read aloud. The words work like an echo chamber and remind me that photography depends so much on the gaze of the artist. Both the photographer and the poet shift our gaze through text, color, repetition. Weems and ford remind us what has changed in our culture, what has yet to change, and what we hope to change.
from here i saw what happened and i cried
after Carrie Mae Weems
the blood is red the blues is red the blues
is blood the red is dirt the dirt is brown
the brown is red the dirt is blood the blood
is blues the blues is brown the brown is skin
the skin is blood the blood is kin the kin
is red the red is blood the blood is new
the new is skin the skin is news the news
is brown the brown is noose the noose is red
the red is blues the blues is dirt the dirt
is skin the skin is blues the blues is kin
the kin is brown the brown is blood the blood
is news the news is black the black is new
the new is red the red is noose the noose
is black is blues is brown is red is blood—
— t’ai freedom ford, from & MORE BLACK, Augury Books