December 7 - My Boyfriend Comes Home From Wars Every Day
by Sang Chi Liu
SOUND CLIP:
Astrologer: I am ready for this reading of your sign today. We are going to fill ourselves with positive energies. Tuesday, December 7th, 2021. You get very good ideas. Soon you will live a beautiful, sentimental adventure. Taking positive control of the things that happen in your life, and that of your family…
my boyfriend, J, just came back from war
J brought a bag of spinach, pasta, Mozzarella cheese, and tomatoes to my place after work
I brought some crackers and mixed black tea with soy milk
J brought a book I like
J fried the noodles and boiled the vegetables
we talked about Snow Country by Kawabata Yasunari at our dining table
a polished thick wood round table
SOUND CLIP:
YouTuber: Greetings, genius scientists, scientists and citizens of the weird, wild, wonderful world in which we live! As always, I’m your humble science communicator, and I’d like to welcome you to December’s Star Gazing Guide. In the East, Orion continues its celestial battle with Taurus the Bull. Throughout early winter…
we went for a walk after dinner
in the best stargazing month
J is an engineer
he is everything I need
we snuck into The Island
we got around the facial recognition for this gated community
by following the car in front of us
it was a brilliant starry night
we laughed so loud
we don’t need the moon
SOUND CLIP:
Reporter: Hi guys, I'm reporting from Siziwang Banner in North China's inner Mongolia autonomous region. The reentry capsule of China's Chang’e-5 probe landed on the grassland in this region. The returner of Chang’e-5 carries around 2 kilograms of lunar samples the probe collected from the moon.
J was holding my hand when I saw the reflection of the stars
shining in the artificial canals
we walked closer to the water
the stars were the beaks of ducks
I took out my phone camera, lowered the exposure
so the machine eyes only saw the beaks
I made a picture of us in front of the galaxy of beaks
we don’t need stars
stars can be beaks of ducks
SOUND CLIP:
Reporter: now that the astronauts have landed safely on the moon.
Festival Attendee 1: I think it’s very important, but I don’t think it’s any more relevant than, you know, the Harlem Cultural Festival here. I think it’s equal.
Reporter (to someone else): What are your thoughts?
Festival Attendee 2: As far as the scientists go, and everybody that’s involved with the moon landing, and astronauts, I think it’s beautiful, you know. But me, I couldn’t care less. The cash is wasted as far as I’m concerned with getting to the moon. It could have been used to feed poor black people in Harlem and all over the place.
my boyfriend J comes back from wars every day
we live in Los Angeles
have been planning to travel back to China to visit our families
I have been applying for a US visa on my laptop
J has been making aircrafts for the DOD on his desktop
we work from home
he can make aircrafts in his bedroom
Los Angeles doesn’t rain
every day is a starry day
private jets, public airplanes, drones, rockets, military jets, satellites launching
Los Angeles hold all of these in its sky
we don’t need stars
stars can be the fire, the light of these man-made machines in the sky
J gives me hugs after wars/work every day
J doesn’t wear uniform to work
J doesn’t know how to hold a gun
J doesn’t have a superior who orders him to salute
he doesn’t know where his aircrafts have been to yesterday, or where they will go today, or next week
SOUND CLIPS:
Football Announcer: now he’s up to the twenty-five, and he’s hit, and hit hard at the twenty-seven yard line…
Newscaster 1: We interrupt this broadcast to bring you this important bulletin from the United Press. Flash! Washington: The White House announces Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
Political Analyst: This game between the United States and China that we’re just starting to see play has no logical end.
Newscaster 2: In late 2022, NASA will send an ice-mining experiment attached to a robotic lander, to the lunar South Pole. NASA has partnered with an agency named Intuitive Machines for commercial moon delivery. Under the deal, NASA will pay Intuitive Machines 47 million dollars…
J doesn’t kill people
even though sometimes I imagine
one day I will learn one of the stars I saw was J’s aircraft
going on a mission to throw a bomb on top of my Chinese parents
About the Artwork
This poem is the artist pulling out stuff from their archive, looking specifically at things that happened in December historically. The work is about myth, belief, immigration, wars, weapons and how these complexities are embedded in intimate relationships.
Available at: liusangchi.myportfolio.com
About the Artist
Sang Chi Liu grew up in Taiwan. Her interdisciplinary work addresses conflicts within human relationships in a broader sense of social, political, and technological structures.
Curator’s Note
This performance work was originally performed live for Praxinoscope: Months of the Year at 1642 Bar, Historic Filipinotown, Los Angeles California on February 20, 2022.
Imprint Available
The Months of the Year: PerformX Documents No. 1 — now available for purchase. Free for subscribers!
Production Notes
This podcast and performance series is hosted by Derek Denckla. Sound was produced by John Dawson, Magnetic South Studios, ind him @magneticsouthrecordings and listen to his other projects at magneticsouth.bandcamp.com.
Our theme music “Alien Desert” was composed by Cato Gilmour @cato_gilmour. Still images are the work of Derek Denckla, except where otherwise noted.
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