PONDERINGS
January, 2024
frozen over
I visit the site to document my weaving installed in the bunker. The pale woven body sways with each gust of wind, but its long tendrils are anchored by semispheres of ice.
I meander to the pond on the back of the site. I discovered it in the summer while foraging to make natural dyes; the sumac berries caught my attention. Bare branches now afford a clear view of the pond's basin; I am tempted by the emptiness. I pass the dense canopy above the inlet; it is a marvelous, improvisational tangle of branch and vine. I proceed inward, dodging stems while brittle, frost-bitten leaves crunch under my warm boots. In the basin, ordinarily mundane shades of beige and brown come alive under a thin skin of frost. Icy blue-white fractals rise up among loose roots, leaves, sand, and soil. Every surface glistens.
As my eyes and feet wander, my brain is bombarded with dopamine. The pond is littered with evidence of the foundry. Overflows of steel stiffened by cool air are coated with a firey residue; the burnt orange matches the thin shoots of willow laying among its own curly brown leaves. There are metal grinding discs, canvas sleeves, and fragments of ceramic tubes, some encrusted with a thin layer of slag (a waste / bi-product of the sand-casting process). Slag is everywhere: some is smooth walled and sage green and blue, and other chunks are matte brown. Glassy interior surfaces are interrupted by gaseous pockets (vesicals). Each piece is an artifact of industrial geology frozen in a modern construct of time.
July, 2024
poetry-in-place: improvisational poetry while recording insect songs
Tiny legs creeping up grassy staircases
Who is talking to who?
Your outdoor symphony
is full of domestic chaos
a glass clanks on the hard countertop
or did you drop a plate in the sink?
a pocket knife drags across the table
amidst cicada like waves
are you carving your initials
on leaf and stem?
water gurgles and you
scratch scratch scraaaaaatch
are you trying to escape
like an animal traped in a wall?
a deep throated goose moans
while crickets scuttle under my shins
are you swimming closer to me on a long blade of Johnson grass?
Uhhhhhhhhh uh uh uh
Panting panting
with soft breath
Are you making love?
June, 2024
two bodies
The pond's rim is teeming with ivy and oak and continues to fill with rain. With my attention diverted to its perimeter, I consider the systems around this site-within-a-site.1 I know that water rolls down the transite roofs and is carried through a series of drains to the pond. I trace their paths with an old site map, and by foot between thick iron grills half-covered with gravel.
Concrete surfaces under the pavilion often puddle with water, and the loading dock is half-full. The trusses above are reflected in the still, olive green water. I walk down the slanted median to the water's edge and see tadpoles in various stages of development swimming among floating bits of algae.
There are two ponds on the site; both are constructed vessels that hold bodies of water and life. They are connected by impervious surfaces such as concrete and asphalt, but underneath is the same soil as the field and the neighboring Exxon-owned forest.
Land runs deep beneathe man-made infrastructures which offer access and also act as barriers which impose control. Social and cultural constructs (colonialism and capitalism), and their architectures and urban flows dictate how one moves through 'human space'2. Roads and bridges bisect rivers, concrete winds and contains, and plot maps draw invisible boundaries.
Despite these occupations, matter contacts matter above and below the horizon. Asphalt covers ancient soils, roots evade chain-link fence lines, steam meets sky, and water percolates freely through the loamy soil. Systems of 'nature' are only othered by the 'us' that exists in a shallow notions of time. Yet life persists in loading docks and 'deep pits' that are now ponds.
December, 2024
on systems / silica / sand
a granular connector
from mountain to land to
ocean and river
back to field and foundry
in the bottom of this pond
which receives and holds
an archive of accumulations
and entangled systems —
architectural, industrial, ecological
sand shifts and filters
sediment makes stuck
materials that run amuck
thick black banks
bring water to willow
bent against its will
microscopic architectures
with tiny glassy bodies
breathe life — O O !!
so delicate and ordered
yet scattered at an imperceptible scale
among flattened sardine cans and glints of blue glass and stone
silicate particulate
in varied states
carried by river, rain, and hand
at the water's edge
where paws and claws lay tracks
to drink, to rest, to hunt, to feed
in a cycle and system of reciprocity
among sentient creatures
of two, four, six and eight legs
some sing through leaf and stem
a symphony of systems and vibrations
that fall on dull ears
December, 2024
on windows
A window is an opening
a pane within a plane
nested in a void
tilted and turned, raised and lowered
a transparent valve
to meter light and air
single-paned vintages
boast undulating waves
and tiny bubbled imperfections
modern sashes trap nobel gasses
argon and krypton hidden between layers
elements shield us from elements
a framing device to hone one’s vista
where do we place the window?
what do we want to see?
Windows of opportunity
A time-based situation
Some governed by seasonal cycles
other circumstances and climates
require urgency and action
How will we respond?
1. I created the term 'site-within-a-site' to define the unique spatial, material, or ecological conditions that relate to a specific area or unique feature of or created within a larger, parcel, structure, or space. It is often a place for focused (micro) observation, juxtaposition, or activation within the larger (macro) site. It can be a retention pond on a parcel of land, a room within an architectural space, or a corner within a room. The definition is specific, but also flexible.
2. Bollnow, Otto Friedrich (2011). Human space. London: Hyphen. Edited by Christine Shuttleworth & Joseph Kohlmaier.