a pale space without distinguishing feature or end.
blankness.
a dull throb of a sound always present, barely perceptible.
a whining that ebbs and flows, always there.
blankness.
dull time.
more whining, like sound complaints of tedium.
blanched air, the smell of acrimony.
pale space, dull time.
whiteness without end, smelling tired of itself.
black objects appear throughout.
hazy first, falling into focus.
they are tables, chairs, stoves.
brooms, lawnmowers, whips.
they litter the space, all black.
the whining acquires pulse, becomes rhythm.
vibrating against the pulse, the objects spin, pop, and dip; they whirr into life.
they become young, vibrant Black people.
Chicly-clad and extraordinary in appearance, powerful, casual and cool.
Strong. Surprised.
They see each other.
They see the expanses of pale.
They listen.
the pulsing sound devolves into the dull throb.
They see you.
They consider the expanse and its sounds, its smell.
They stand in formation.
They gasp, grasping for air.
Resisting arrest.
They collapse.
Philosopher Martin Heidegger’s concept of the “ready-to-hand” suggests an unconscious operation turning object into process, through the figure of the tool. I’ve been thinking about Black presence within varied histories of the United States as an operationalized manifestation of tool; as a presence created “ready-to-hand” as an extension of the will to power that white systems of domination and capitalisms enjoy. Black presence in the US continues to be operationalized as a method of quantifying and qualifying; distinguishing and diminishing; denying, exploring, and wondering at. Seldom celebrated or allowed a full measure of complex humanity, Black presence occurs contingently, made manifest as legislation for access to voting and quality schools; as protest and disruption; as ludic celebration destined for transference and disappearance. Theatre tends to operationalize Black presence as well; to treat it as a cypher or a ghost in the machine.
When is Blackness ever unmarked? Black presence inevitably seems to mean in and of itself, as a thing that can be mobilized by others.
August Wilson’s plays resist this tendency, through a surplus of wordplay. In the way that Shakespeare’s characters are not marked as white, necessarily; not materialized in terms of racial dynamic (excepting Othello, of course), Wilson’s theatre proposes Black presence without Black subjugation. Allowed to speak, at great length and depth, toward the terms of their own conception, Wilson’s characters instrumentalize language to confirm their ability in the world. Wilson’s theatre, like Shakespeare’s, doesn’t seem to care about who we are watching it, listening to it, experiencing it. Black presence becomes ontological fact, rather than alternative othering.
With words as tools employed among each other, the Black people breathe.
We debate, we assemble, we disagree. And inevitably, we establish rap music, to emphasize the ready-to-hand of language.