In thinking about the night and memory/forgetting, I was reminded of the work of Lorna Dee Cervantes. I love how night, forgetting, trauma, and memory are all wound so tightly together in this piece. What strikes me, in particular, are the closing lines. In response to the violence that night brings, when these moments register to us, to people at-risk, there may not be adequate language to describe it…but the poet, this deeply connected and emotional center whose language attempts to transcend even the containment of language itself, howls in response. I love this movement towards acknowledging the power of these visceral reactions.
Genre, here, is an important consideration for me when thinking about how people write about night. I have always been deeply drawn to poetry, particularly to work out the violence that I witnessed as a child in my home. When I write in paragraphs and stories, the words have a tendency to come out in a rush, like vomit that’s so hot and acrid that it chokes you. Poetry, on the other hand, forces me to control my language. It provides me an opportunity to contain and think about my feelings in a more thoughtful way. It allows to me to contain the violence in my poetry. It allows me to structure the memories that haunt me, to turn my horror into delicate lines. In essence, reflection in poetry allows me to create a sense of a control that I never had as a child and struggle to have with my emotions as an adult.
Turning back to the issue of night and forgetting, I think that what night allows you to forget, to ignore, and to bury depends entirely on your position to power. The more powerful you are, the more cover is provided in the darkness. The less powerful you are, the more painful night is. Night time is when the hunger pains begin. Night time is when you must be aware of shadows, of wandering hands and unwanted touch, of drunken slurs hurled at you. Night time is when the front door shuts and a new brand of terror sets in.
Cruelty finds solace in the night, a place to writhe and proliferate. Darkness and its association with racialized bodies and peoples doubles this violence over. For marginalized communities, night contains the stories we remember, in horror, but are forced to ignore so that we may continue to trudge forward through our days. Certainly, the night has its liberatory moments – but we must put those things away by dawn because our survival depends on it.
Below is a map of significant places of residence and their corresponding years.
Genre, here, is an important consideration for me when thinking about how people write about night. I have always been deeply drawn to poetry, particularly to work out the violence that I witnessed as a child in my home. When I write in paragraphs and stories, the words have a tendency to come out in a rush, like vomit that’s so hot and acrid that it chokes you. Poetry, on the other hand, forces me to control my language. It provides me an opportunity to contain and think about my feelings in a more thoughtful way. It allows to me to contain the violence in my poetry. It allows me to structure the memories that haunt me, to turn my horror into delicate lines. In essence, reflection in poetry allows me to create a sense of a control that I never had as a child and struggle to have with my emotions as an adult.
Turning back to the issue of night and forgetting, I think that what night allows you to forget, to ignore, and to bury depends entirely on your position to power. The more powerful you are, the more cover is provided in the darkness. The less powerful you are, the more painful night is. Night time is when the hunger pains begin. Night time is when you must be aware of shadows, of wandering hands and unwanted touch, of drunken slurs hurled at you. Night time is when the front door shuts and a new brand of terror sets in.
Cruelty finds solace in the night, a place to writhe and proliferate. Darkness and its association with racialized bodies and peoples doubles this violence over. For marginalized communities, night contains the stories we remember, in horror, but are forced to ignore so that we may continue to trudge forward through our days. Certainly, the night has its liberatory moments – but we must put those things away by dawn because our survival depends on it.
Below is a map of significant places of residence and their corresponding years.