Call and Response: Collaboration at a Distance Round 16, Special Edition: TEXT

In March 2020 when we went on lockdown due to the pandemic, the Shoebox Arts team created “Call and Response: Collaboration at a Distance” as a way to stay connected and to check in with and support each other. We are just finishing up Round 14 and have enjoyed the process, experiences and friendships that we have made. The project draws on the tradition of Jazz and Exquisite Corpse as a way for the artists to ping pong creatively off of each other. 

Cover image by Jody Zellen

Artist Talk July 30th

Pradnya Kapshikar and Shloka Shankar

Aishwarya Vedula and Nino Khundadze

bsh

Kristine Schomaker and Sheli Silverio

Joas Nebe and Karen Hochman Brown

Sue Jenkins and Monica Marks

Faina Kumpan and Vince Alanib

Reksi Muhammad Sidik and Julie O’Sullivan

Laura Henneforth and Ashley Hester

Rebecca Bennett Duke and Leo Francisco

Morgan Grimes and Kamelyta

Sergey Dobrynov and Pascha Goodwin

Ruby Vartan and Anne M Bray

Megan Geckler and Maddie Maser

April Bermudez and Adrienne Cole

Eva-Marie Amaya and Stacey Moore

1 Eva-Marie CLOSED

2 Stacey Moore

3 Eva-Marie it

4 Stacey Moore

5 Eva-Marie Now

6 Stacey Moore

7 Eva-Marie Letter Toss Liberty

9 Eva-Marie We the People

10 Stacey Moore

11 Eva-Marie YOU

12 Stacey Moore

Sue Cutler and Regina Morales

Stacy Prihoda and Sina Evans

Susan Karhroody and Beatrice Antonie Martino

June Stoddard and Genie Davis

1 June Stoddard – Speak

2 Genie Davis

What are Words…

In the face of inchoate longing?Salient advice tolaugh love sing.I mean those are the

important things.But I have the rightto remain silent and sad.I have the right to feel bad.

I have the right to notlove you.I have the right to demandthe truth.

But ask and you mightnot receive.Hope and you maystill grieve.

What are the words,the ones I never got to say?They fly on the wingsof distant doves

to the rumble of thunderlike aching drums,and they beat away,away.

2 Genie Davis

3 June Stoddard

Hope is a muscle

And mine are slack

Unused moving along a tired track

The train of my brain

Easily moves to worries to fears

Rather than being here

Habits move along tired

Easier to travel the same route

The comfortable trail

Than dream beyond it

Though my wishes are there

Waiting for me to see them

When I close my eyes and

Breathe

4 Genie davis

Soon

You know the soulstands at the crossroadsof hope and a quarter to moon…

waiting for the rights of passageto this world,from this room –

Looking out the windowto the past,in my present state

I need to stretch the focusBetween endless time and too late.The signs are waiting,

take a road, take a seat,draw a number,read a moment,

weave the dayupon your loom.Take a chance –

just make it soon.

4 Genie Davis

5 June Stoddard

Lying in bed

Need my head

Sun about to rise

My wide-open eyes

This is not my room

Did I get away too soon?

Am I up to this travel?

Or will I unravel?

Mind on fire

Or is it a liar

Train in the distance

With so much insistence

Honking alarm

Then a voice of charm

Different sounds

Aboud

Not my room

But same moon

I’ll be alright

If just for one night

Open the door

I want more!

5 June Stoddard

6 Genie Davis

Blue Ice

I live on the corner of fire and flame,waiting for the ashes to rise up again.You’ll see where I’m standing,no shadows, no shame,

if there’s something I’m missing,please call it by name.

I am a dancer,on a stage of blue ice,step lightly tomorrow,it pays to be nice.

Feel this rapture of cold?Still it’s this burning within meThat makes me so bold.I’ll ask, but will not wait,

for the answers to come.then I’ll run.I’ll run into night.I will let you stay waiting –

you will miss my light.There’s only one longing,it’s always for more,you once said you’d take me –

I once said I’d take you –but we’ve closed that door.Come open a windowto the place in my heart

where a small new beginningcould get a fresh start.Remember the moment,be happy, alive,

there’s no reason for waiting,no pain left to hide.

6 Genie Davis

7 June stoddard

The Calling Place

Fling open the window

And fly out

To the calling place

Where you can’t hide

Down the block

Up the street

In the sky

On the beach

A beaconing cry

Reaching inside

Turning and churning

To open your heart

Into a vastness

Your mind cannot see

Turn off the news

If just for a moment

Take a dip in the ocean

Dive deep and clear

Burdens washed off

You are still here.

7 June Stoddard – The Calling Place

8 Genie Davis

Pass

And the earth rested,because we were gone,and my words drifted away on pillowsof smoke

and time passed as it does,when I speak to the candle I litto remember you –and apologize

as we do for the past,(we will be sending such ferventhopes of forgivenessto this earth but alas)

as it was your time to goyears ago,baby inside me you nevergot to know,

as we laughed together beforethe facts I hate to rememberit was too late.The fragrant wax melting by

this window etchesshadow scents across the glass.I can write words with myfingers that equally will not last.

All things pass.Love you thought you’d keepforever, death because youdie only to this life

smoke and embersfire and ashsky beyond this windowthis world

our path.See our shadows, drifting past?And the earth rested.Peace at last.

8 Genie Davis

9 June Stoddard

“Take it out” you wrotethose last words weigh on meI never got to apologizeFor the hope doctors gaveThat I latched ontoYou were SupermanThe one who would live on.

The costy last week of lifeNo one knows how to speakOf deathHow to let goWe will never die, right?

The love becomes part of youYou merge as oneThen half of you is goneAn earlier self surfacesFrom beforeRootless.

9 June Stoddard

10 Genie Davis

Journeys

Like the ocean with her waves,the ache to be savedthe road well pavedwith good intentions,

from the cradle to the graveit’s the queen, the king,the knave –dusty fragments that is all,

and the bones.But I choose to make a home,let my feet weigh downlike stones,

we choose our journeys.Once I drove so many miles of road,loving every stop, every sightevery memory –

that no one remembersexcept for me.Does it matter anyway,these tendril wisps of day,

it is all so fleeting.If we pass each other hence,leaving notes hung on a fencewhat will we say as greeting?

On we go, travelers aloneevery minute every wordevery second that I heard –onward onward onward

on we go.Until we reach the endwhen nothing can be saidroad closed – no retreating.

Write it down you’ll forget,no cheating.That’s the testmemorize the map —

Your heart’s still beating

10 Genie Davis

11 June Stoddard

A red ripe strawberry yesterdayToday is gone, a pothos leaf upon the groundA breeze, wind chimes stir, bell whirsFountain bubbles next to me thinking of longevityDecades within this homeWe created togetherNow I am alone

So much space I’ve filledWith memories and potential selvesPiles of desired unread booksCloset bursting with colorSpider webs swiffered away yesterdayMalaise weighing the brightness downYears of masking, laws struck downWould my IVF daughters exist?If the righteous had their way?

My mind cannot go back toWhite gloves at the women’s clubPoise class to learn to move with grace and subservienceMen’s eyes, words, and hands upon meAs if my body weren’t my ownThis is not the world IVoted, marched, protested, organized for and changed!Does my voice no longer matter?How will my daughters fare?This world turned us-under.

Who ate the strawberry?Always gone before I get it.

11 June Stoddard

12 Genie Davis

For Someone Who Counted Stars

I’m giving you another sky.If there is one thing you remember,and one I won’t forget,it will be the moon watch at night,

the sunset clouds,the rainbows from sunthrough a prism of glassat the top of the stairs.

Until I see you,in a later or another life,I will give youone more sky.

Because we neverreally said goodbye.I can imagine you take wingand fly.

I hope you’ll try.

12 Genie Davis

Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja and Yula Tregub Morris

1 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja My Body…

2 Yulia Tregub Morris

3 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja Good Vibes Love

4 Yulia Tregub Morris Red

5 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja Rose Cola

6 Yulia Tregub Morris Subway Music

7 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja Sub Way Music Take Two

8 Yulia Tregub Morris Love Republic

9 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja Love Republic Take Two

10 Yulia Tregub Morris Look Above

11 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja She Looked Up

12 Yulia Tregub Morris If looking down

13 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja Water Falls

14 Yulia Tregub Morris Message

15 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja The Message Is We Fight On

16 Yulia Tregub Morris At the exhibition All in the garden

17 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja At The Exhibition At The Cheech

18 Yulia Tregub Morris Music

19 Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja The UnderTown Shops

Darren McManus and Jody Zellen

Pau Gold and Mary Ruffato

Glynnis Reed and Lybra Olbrantz

Day 1. Glynnis Reed- Body is Blooming Alive

Alive

My body isblooming, aliveawakeat the whim of the tidewide eyed glances at the powerof morningand the deepest diveto the dropped outbottom of midnightrushed blackto the surfaceof our centerand the boiling rotof the Earth

Day 2. Lybra Olbrantz – Diver Portal

Day 3. Glynnis Reed – Descendants of the Crossing

Day 4. Lybra Olbrantz – How does one come to know oneself

How does one come to know oneself?Hidden veils of spectral beauty delight, tell a story of the souls true flight.Cyclic transformation through a web of interpretation, a monolithic lens of internal alchemical transmutation, absorbs molecular energy into ethereal evaporation. Cellular celebration, a dance, a decadence, a delight to be new every seven years. A release, a filling of the cup. Every 28 days full again, like the moon, like the goddess, like the river flows, divine feminine will always shed her womb and begin anew.The force that makes things happen, all life comes through she, from the we, true divinity, no boundaries, what lies within transforms constantly, a multilayered entity as sacred energies. The difference between ideologies and the rhythm of the soul pounding the heartbeat of the earth into eternal song and dance: I sing, I cry and most importantly I’m alive, I’m alive, I’m alive!

Day 8. Lybra Olbrantz – The wild cat graces my presence -amazing!

The wild cat graces my presence -amazing!Ratatat, split splat, lined up with the 20 posh white kids from Connecticut. They won’t let me through, they won’t let me pass but I’ll be damned if I’m not front row for the last-Song and it goes 17 years, 17 years? Yes, 17 years, I’ve been rapping for 17 years and the hook had me hooked from the beginning of the drop, the beginning of time and I’m just a step in line and I’m flashing back to a time when I was 17 years, 17 years? Yes, 17 years old and I wouldn’t take it back. When we stole the Hot Chip poster off the walls of Terminal 5 (I swear I’ll be back). It’s autumnal, it’s no lens glasses, long brown hair, free sweaters and stolen glances, Pink Berry on the steps of the New York City Library, college hipsters, flourishing in fluorescence, it’s 80’s babies parties in the Bronxville mansions, I heard they’re worth a million and the taxi driver tells us about the stories of the famous. So here I am 20 with my high top sneakers, 2 headbands to stay ahead of the trends and all I care about at this moment is can I get ahead of these damn posh white kids from Connecticut so I can be front row when the band plays Wildcat.

Elena V. Stromberger-Harnoune and Skye Amber Sweet