Tonight No Poetry Will Serve: Eileen Myles
Tonight No Poetry Will Serve by Alfredo Jaar offers a powerful reflection on the limits of language and the role of creative expression in times of tragedy. A lament for today’s darkness and a call to find the words to confront these tragic hours, the bold new public intervention displays the arresting title of a poem by Adrienne Rich (1929–2012), a figure of inspiration for Jaar since the 1980s, who observed the limits of words in times of unthinkable violence: “no poetry can serve to mitigate such acts, they nullify language itself,” she wrote in 2011. Throughout November 2023, Alfredo Jaar and CIRCA commissioned a series of poetic dialogues, curated by Vittoria de Franchis, from international writers, thinkers and speakers. Giving voice to those who find themselves silenced or without words, the poems hope to achieve Rich’s ambition that creative expression can reconcile conflicting realities.
We are going through a very repressive moment, when nuance is lost and free speech is threatened. But I strongly believe that the spaces of art and culture must remain spaces of freedom. Artists will not be intimidated. In this environment, I have turned to the words of anti-war campaigner and poet Adrienne Rich to reflect both the limits of language and the frustration felt by many that voices for peace and justice cannot sound out as clearly as we wish. And, as part of the CIRCA commission, I am turning to today’s poets, writers, and artists, to support a forum for creative expression where the clear-sighted demands of humanity and empathy can be heard. In these times when politics have failed us miserably, art and culture are our only hope. Art is like the air we breathe, without art, life would be unlivable. Art creates spaces of resistance, spaces of hope.
THEM (Palestinian) by Eileen Myles
They had
beds &
rooms
they had
socks &
babies
they had fire
they had a
toilet
they had a
book
they had
school
they had mous
taches &
cunts &
bellies
they had
feet &
toenails &
arguments &
friends
they had
hot soup
they had
hunger
laughter
pain
cellphones
they had kids
they missed
each other
they came
home
I’m not
sure about
this
but he
was killed
in his
house
with his
family. I
tie my
shoes.
I’m going to
the gym.
Through
this horrific
experience.
I’ll bring
my recyclables
down
contacting
people
try every
few
minutes
to call people
from Gaza.
My toe hurts.
I struck
it against
a chair
in Tempe
Many
medical
journals
are writing
about genocide
in Gaza
& think
it’s okay
I have nothing
for the
baby. I randomly
sob
we’re not
seeing
the support
from the medical
community
they ignore
the calls
they don’t
say Israel
he has died
they don’t
say he
has been
killed.
I can’t find
my head
phones
or the band
for the
clamshell
I make tea
tossing
cards into
an imaginary
future
in which
my handwriting
& my
political
thoughts
are con
sidered
this is prose
war is
prose
the coldness
of my
pastimes
is poetry
my safety
the what
has been
torn
away from
my fellow
my neighbors
my friends
is Palestine
is poetry
poetry is home
& the loss
of it. It being robbed
from a
child
or the children
of the nakba
who 75 years
years
later as
an old man
walks south
from rubble
home
streaming
tears
tears are home
(continues…)
Eileen Myles (they/them) is a poet, novelist & art journalist. Their most recent books are Pathetic Literature (an anthology) & a “Working Life” (poems). They live in NYC & Marfa TX.