Fro The Cabinet of Unconsciousness (Natalie & the Waves) – FESCH.TV

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This collaborative video/sound work by Stephanie Ellis Schlaifer and Cheryl Wassenaar combines video footage of the aftermath of a tropical storm with a layered, audio recording of Schlaifer’s poem “From the Cabinet of Unconsciousness (Natalie & the Waves). The poem, from her new collection Well Waiting Room, is part of a series that explores the bureaucracy of the mind through interior political cabinets. The poem is set in a dreamlike, oceanic environment, where waves accumulate in a surreal fashion—they pile up like buildings, they tremble vulgarly, they become the horizon. In an incantatory voice, the speaker urges the subject, who has to see the waves, to take Natalie with her—she shouldn’t go alone. “Take Natalie with you. / Tie your hands together. / Braid your hair together. / Make a pact together before the sea. / Hold together as the water overtakes you. / The water brines the top of your throat. / Hold together as you become salt.”