title hanging
Άννα Αποστολίδου
Το κείμενο είναι ένα κριτικό υπερκειμενικό ποίημα που προέκυψε από την ανάγνωση του πρώτου τόμου του ηλεκτρονικού περιοδικού φεμινιστιqά. Χρησιμοποιεί αυτο-εθνογραφική γραφή για να προβληματοποιήσει την έμφυλη υποκειμενικότητα σε μια περίοδο κρίσης και διακινδύνευσης. Η κειμενική και η οπτική αναπαράσταση των εξωτερικών πηγών λειτουργούν συμπληρωματικά με το κυρίως κείμενο για να περιγράψουν αυτό που η γράφουσα βιώνει ως ένα προσωπικό και πειθαρχικό σημείο καμπής. Βιβλία, ποιήματα, σκίτσα και ψηφιακά κολάζ συνθέτουν ένα ακαδημαϊκό φεμινιστικό αφήγημα για την επιτέλεση του εαυτού, της μητρότητας, του στοχασμού – και τα όριά της.
by Anna Apostolidou
This text is a critical poem that sprung from the reading of volume 1 of the electronic journal feministiqá. It employs auto-ethnographic reflection in order to problematize gendered subjectivity at a time of crisis and jeopardy. Textual and visual representation work complimentarily in order to describe what the writer sees as a personal and disciplinary turning point. Books, poems, sketches, and digital collages make up a theoretical/poetic feminist narrative about the performance of gendered selfhood, motherhood and thought – and its limitations.
to press (gently)
on green words
it’s been twelve years and the brain –unconsulted by the rest of her- still weeps most mornings
this is the time i naturally go to bed
no matter how horrific last night’s dreams
she always feels better by the softness of their curves mocking the covers
rise and shine
or, has the total collapse of her normal
-up-in-the-afternoon-coffee-smoke-read-alcohol-out-sex-scream-write-
lifestyle led her to saturated fat?
tea & inbox break
the eye catches a playful dictation:
φεμινιστιqά
file downloaded
utter silence
it’s twelve fifteen and she’s finished volume 1
this scholarship has always played first with the gut, then with her intellect (cartesian, yes!)
lost in this volume, can’t find herself entirely in any of the works
an acute desire to become one thing in its entirety
radical, rather than the other way round
they are pouring down and dripping out of her
ancient waters of joy and affliction and decay
she longs to be it
examines the crises inscribed on her body
traded her passions for some work, unnoticed shifts that turned her estranged
from her very own -isms
an odd cell, alienated, queered by her kind
she hoards a thousand swallows in her pockets
they have nowhere to go
work work work
trifling miscellaneous tasks
not me not me not me
possessed by the zestless of thoughts
dis/possessed
wires and veins blossom out of her chest in equal proportions
once in a blue moon a wild flower
comes down in the kitchen for a ginger-carrot smoothie
her sister has MS
she didn’t even know nightingales could get MS
the injections right next to the butter
she didn’t even
her stomach still a mess
the feminist inside her -tired of footnotes, scared of half-read piles of
other feminists- she bursts
i too belong in there
a middle aged straight mum
all her alarm clocks buzz at once
i need to stroke the birds that hold my hammock
keep it up vs. fuck it up (nanosecond dilemmas)
favourite tv series on
(how is this different from plastic soccer moms? does sheer reflection make it any better?)
help me recognize cozy from hypnotic
she has surrendered all its glossy, sharper traits to these two
-unsuspecting yet- fleshful citations
the questioning, the anger, the desire
hey, still a woman?
four luminous young nipples have begun flourishing in the umbrella of her
arms, under her goodnight kisses
rustles of bones and lips and toes cracking up graciously to welcome all the
bleeding
how do i bear the beauty? the loss of full command?
can’t sleep
i need to write this down
now now!
or else
this too will slide down the red hatch of her unused delightful thoughts
call it auto-ethnography? mid-laundry poetry?
is this what gendered writing feels like after all?
and does it matter to those outside oneself?
their warm breastfed matter will be awake(ned) soon
may i? I’m out of time
ok then
you decide
let’s leave it open to you
you, the other feminists
my crazy goat who broke her leg
-again
External sources
‘quotes bricolage’, quotes from Anzaldúa, Butler, Derrida, Foucault, Lorde & Yalom, embedded on painting by unknown artist; arranged by Anna Apostolidou
word compilation; created by Anna Apostolidou
‘birdy’; sketch by Frida Kayali (2018)
Video clip ‘Lamma Bada’; performed by Despoina Apostolidou, DOI
Βιογραφικό
Η Άννα Αποστολίδου είναι κοινωνική ανθρωπολόγος και μητέρα της Φρίντας και της Τερέζας. Σπούδασε στο Πάντειο, στο University College London και στο Ελληνικό Ανοιχτό Πανεπιστήμιο (Ε.Α.Π.). Είναι μεταδιδακτορική ερευνήτρια και διδάσκουσα στο Πάντειο Πανεπιστήμιο και καθηγήτρια-σύμβουλος στο Ε.Α.Π.
Bio
Anna Apostolidou is a social anthropologist and the mother of Frida and Tereza. She has studied at Panteion University, at University College London and at the Hellenic Open University (HOU). She is a postdoctoral researcher and adjunct lecturer at Panteion University, and a tutor at the HOU.
