Manuel Palacio, artist, bring the light dance in the shadows
Light & Air
let me grow WINGS .TouchT. I want to DaNCeBermuda poet Andra Simons
Light & Air
I saw Andra in his one-person choreopoem “Sometimes an Ass is Gotta Shake, the Load Off His Back.” That performance led to him receiving the Bermuda Gold Award by Bermudian Magazine for Best Actor. It was a courageous show. It was captivating. There was no place to hide. Rock Island coffee shop is normally full with ten people. I think the performance had thirty people or more each night. In a space smaller than most living room and he put on a show, a genius show.
I first saw Andra at the popular ” Flow Sundays” he was one of its founders along with DJ Beatnik and voodoo child Suzanne Mayall at the time Flow Sunday was the best art on the island. Every time I went there was an honest form of expression by Bermuda’s diverse community.
Flow Sunday also publish a little periodical, poets would write about many things, including my first one-man show “I’is” at Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art, it was a humbling show. I debut my sculptures. El Bembón Y Ella; “old workhorse on Betsey’s Friend,” my life size painting I’is, The Dance, my first sets of prints, fashion by the very friendly Amethyst of “Spirit Wear”. And the fresh music by another flow Sunday founder DJ artist Beatnik Rubaine. To call Beatnik, a DJ falls short of what he does. He seamlessly, flow, jazz, hip-hop, R&B, classical, funk, African, alternative, rock, you name it. With the atmosphere and synergy of the crowd al the while making it feel like he’s just playing for you with vinyl’s two turntables on a microphone. “I’is” was a cool, diverse and fun show.
Andra wrote something so simple that made me feel proud. He said, “Manuel your like light and air and air”. Those words were the inspiration for the show. Bermuda art community at the time was undergoing a small renaissance.
Our Bermuda National Gallery and our “Bacardi Biennial” were in its embryonic stage. And there was a sense of corporation with all artists. I wanted a way to celebrate that synergy. I ask the people involved in the arts to pose nude for Just for one setting at their convenience. I wanted the show to have a sense of immediateness, a sense of bravery and exposure. I wanted it to be free: of shame and guilt.
All this in conservative Bermuda was not that easy; it took courage. Many of my fellow artist and art supporters were willing to cooperate. After the drawing, I handed my work and soft pastels over to Andra, and he just started to write. He wrote with adeptness with ease. It was neat to watch. You think he might have to think about what to write. But no, he just wrote with the ease of a genius with the confidence of the anointed. There were lots of good thing about that show. For example it had sponsored: John and Judy Collis; “The Edge” men store, without them, the show would not have achieved the success it did. It seems like Bermuda’s entire diverse community came out to Kafu Hair and galleries’ debut.
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Wait…
for me to Speak
i am the undercurrent of an island
well,
Swirling Shaking in
one spot
drink i am the poison
the power
a passion rooted in holes
that rumbles and roars
from the base up to
the eye and quenches.
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.god.
waits
.here.
She is tired of men who wait.
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my mother
gave me roar
which i kept in honor
of her in a box below my
belly
in my childhood i learned
the spell to shape sound into
wings
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yes
the
answer id Loquat
seeds
(which i dig to bury in the Bulbous Blue beneath my tongue)
it is these small things in life
that GROW
hard on
the
skin
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this is the nature
of Solitude
to Quake
to chastise to sex to burn
to Limit to search to become the roof over which
i choose
to call home.
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i was told at nine
that i had thighs
Like my grandma
a face like my aunt
had i hands like my
momma? now i walk
21 miles and an hour
to hold my father
let me grow WINGS
.TouchT.
i want to DaNCe
remember
me
as
the man
wo
disposed of my wings
and
flavored my tongue
with life.
i am…
my
body’s PAIN
caught Somewhere Between his
crotch and my Pussy core
STOP!
i can
conquer
the shore
with the
Span
across the
Soles of
my
feet
Length of my
Chest
and
my
Lips.
i was told at nine
that i had thighs
Like my grandma
a face like my aunt
had i hands like my
momma? now i walk
21 miles and an hour
to hold my father
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i travel 7/8 of the globe
to find a paper heart in
the shape of my soul
i returned with a
paper cup
holding the deep
pacific blue
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it took a lot for me to do this
why are you here?
yes i am naked, a stone to your
head,…
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i am two backs
of a triangular coin
tossed till tornado in blue island air
are you afraid…my head id full with me
and still dancing forward on three legs
and my tales of her story will bring
wealth to anyones tarnishes bowls of blood
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do not underestimate the power of
this tropical storm. Limestone will
pillow your ignorance and bending
palms, will break the safety of
yourselves and i still there
will move to beds at sea.
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i planted a
hibiscus hedge
around my soul
in June
and waited with
sour in heart
for purple to bloom.
i entered with glass as
deep as the atlantic to water
where i root, unbeknownst to me
i nourished at the back of my closet
the Length in rue of a mourning
glory vine suit.
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i ask you not to
push where my heart
swell… i asked as
still as a lizard on my
bedroom wall… i asked
once just the same as
i laid upon your stain
sheets… i did ask not
to push…
there was no one there
to pull me up after i had
fallen as hard as your…
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i
delivered four ships to
berth with ropes of my womb
one I lost to the tide
3 are tall ships across the
ocean tango
sails to blow hem toward
home and lost again
however I have rediscovered immortality
in the ebb of time, i have tamed the tongue
of fate by dreaming back to 1000 score
yesterdays, seizing the offing like a fish
wriggling for slaughter…
i am beauty, the commencement and
closure.
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i hide the evening hours
in the small of my back
and wait for the stars to shoot
past, the galaxy to milk and away.
the junk in orbit around me to burn
through my atmosphere
i have a revolution to finish
360° of reflection
and when
i
awake
tomorrow i will trade these
evenings hours soft in my back
for the scorch of a midday sun
to brand across my chest
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love is the daily tragedy of
a setting sun
the wingspan of a long tail over a
water sky blue
the lost cahow to return
Love is the perfect pitch of a new
skinned drum
the bursting vermillion of a fruit tree
of dusk
my Lips to inhale the breath
from my chasmal Lover
who has never had tears
trickle at dusk
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i wanted life to hold me. i found you instead
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I cursed a white moon
once so that i may dance
under the sun
i kiss a black man twice
so that i may sing into his
ear.
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my strength
is
in
the vastness of
my
thought…
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read the fine print between my ribs
and my ass and you will discover
the very subtext of destiny and
wind
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there is a pulsating
power in
this
Belly
and if this home world
can not Stomache
my rumble my reign
my resonating
rose
fuck it
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some
times
I
here
my
name
in
kiskadee songs.
it is those
times i run to
the dark and
with for pride
to kiss my eyelids
and shame to knot
in my bowel. Calm to
lead me out
again.
