Altered Barbie

I am posting the original spoken word piece I just performed at 50 Shotwell in San Francisco, in the heart of the mission district. This piece was read in the midst of many pieces by women and men all dealing with the subject matter of Barbie, her influence, her legacy. We are all affected.

With no further ado, I give you...."Long plastic Hair"

Long plastic hair. Scissors. Long plastic hair.
I am ten years old, grinning, eyes shining with excitement. I take the scissors to the hair...leaving the helpless dolls shocked at their new makeover…
LESBIAN BARBIES!! All of them! New, improved dyke haircuts all around.
Little girls dreaming big.
Little girls dreaming tiny.
Tiny waists, impossible breasts, we wait for our busts to grow, our ken doll perfect boyfriend, just the right swagger, just the right income level, fast car, picket fence, 2.4 children in private schools
Any American girl knows this.
Any American girl knows the GREAT Disappointment settling in upon realizing that we will never live up,
never measure up, never be her. We know BARBIE cannot truly speak. She does not work, she does not grow.
She exists for fashion, for Ken to come rescue her from her pink box, from her anatomically incorrect prison.
Imagine their relationship.
“Oh Ken, if only we could go to the dream house in Malibu and never have to throw parties with Skipper again. That girl takes way too much attention away from me.”
“Yes, Barbie, your wish is my command.”
“Oh Ken, nobody understands me like you do”
“Yes Barbie, I understand you”
“Do I look fat in this bikini, Ken?”
“No Barbie, you look perfect”
“Perfect, Ken, I look perfect.”
At this point, the lesbian Barbies in my arsenal are rolling their eyes; heaving great sighs,
knowing she will never reach an orgasm with KEN they step in, wanting to free her from her oppressive and twisted dream world.
Little girls dreaming big. Little girls dreaming tiny. Tiny girls dreaming.
Barbie has no clitoris. Her proportions are intended to suggest sexual desirability but she has no way to receive pleasure. Only to convey that she can provide pleasure.
Little girls dreaming, Big girls having nightmares.
Butch and Femme Barbie get together only to realize they lack the parts that make them women. Identities shatter into a million pieces on the kitchen tiles.
Ask Any American girl, she knows the meaning of identity shattering.
You build yourself a space inside your mind, complete with self affirmation and kindness, only to have an insipid television commercial rip away your sanity, tell you that you are inferior, you need this product, you need this make up, you need this relationship or you are not worthy of love….
Let us proclaim to Barbie: seemingly innocuous idol of idealized beauty
we do not worship at the altar of skinny, we will not make way
for the patriarchy
we thank our ancestors who gave us large bone structures or
rounded features
These bodies are our birthrights
The spirits designed us this way
YES, Barbie, we celebrate women
designed by their ancestors
blessed with bodies
that don't fit these ideals
No, we do not worship at the altar of skinny
we do not bow before idols
who lack the fullness and density of true female form
Allow us to radiate the warmth of spirit as shattered identities begin to heal
True reflections allow us to embody
all that is woman
fierce, voracious and abundant.

climate change

You cannot get away from it. Nobody on earth can. Discussions of it, fear of it, denial of it. Climate change is becoming one of the "hottest" topics known to our vastly shifting world. What does it mean that natural disasters will become, are becoming more frequent and severe? People will have to come together. We have to make the best of what is to come considering the future is uncertain. It is uncertain whether or not we can stop the climate from changing so dramatically so as to make our world a place that cannot be inhabited by humanity and other species.

I am not in denial that our climate is changing. Nor am I vastly afraid of it. I believe we are under going many global shifts and that the outcome will be for the highest good. The earth will remain. And if the earth is destroyed, spirit will remain. We are not our bodies. We are not our home. We are more than that. We cannot grasp it while mired in our circumstances and clinging to that which we must for survival but it resonates as true. Humanity has never been about mortal life. Our short lifetimes are metaphors. They are stories that spirits beyond space and time tell to each other. We are much more than we have imagined.

I AM

(from January 2008)
I am
speaking to the spaces
you left wide open
with your holy stare
the moments collide
drifting out from pendulous silence
judgments cease when I am gripped by that Greater Truth
you have made an impression
but that doesn't mean much since I am
almost always in awe of something
and should there be some formal release of a five year relationship
if not in a poem then where, when and how do I pay respects to that which was my sole comfort or addiction as it were
and the constant stream flowing is still there
pouring from my wrists
and you glide into distraction position
I am writing to the eternal omnipotent you
the ego pressing itself insistently into these thoughts
like someone's body on a too crowded bus
my heart, my art, my soul, my dreams are lacking
but I am truly caught up in you, momentarily
and everything is just a letter
as in letters making up words
so my letters are molecules
and space expanding
I AM
letters to you on that personal most intimate level
holding you and myself to higher standards than would ever be possible to reach
but in reaching those high standards
we might well exceed them
if not now, then in a dream
beyond the constructs of time
your listless power, holding my wrists down
when they want to speak has damaged me
but I never take damage seriously
presently I AM
in that process of waiting
the eternal God search has the goddess erupting in fits of laughter inside
I AM presently preoccupied
planning to become much more impressive very soon
that last ME you met was just a personality in preparation for what is to come
I AM
holding back rivers of observation as I hear you speak
what you reveal does not fall on deaf ears
I see and hear un intended revelations
I read between lines of un rehearsed script
and notice the planet start to change.

oh, tadasana.

"compassion." this simple word. this precious concept. compassion is one thing that we are capable of, that I know I live for. I live for moments of embodied compassion. All we are doing here, mostly, is learning about relationships. We are refining, as if we are waking up slowly from a dream, our relationships to grasping, to aversion and to confusion. Sometimes our confusion is vast, sometimes it is relatively benign. We refine our relationships to these three things and behold, we transform ourselves. You do not have to do anything to align yourself with your chakras. And sometimes, you do. It is the great gift of many eastern teachings that the Western mind struggles with. Holding two seemingly contradictory states or things as true. We exist in dualities, in two-ness, in separateness. Light and shadow. Our minds instantly analyze, categorize, fix. And yet, nothing is broken. We are one, even in conflict, even pitted against each other.