the golden spot

I Lift My Lamp Beside the Golden Door*, by Dorothy Iannone, the High Line at 22nd St. New York, February 2018 - December 2019 (photo: a. girling)

Today’s art is from Dorothy Iannone (1933 - 2022), an American artist who was based in Berlin and was known for her works celebrating female sexuality. The High Line, where the above piece was on display for two years, is a public park built on an historic elevated rail line on the West Side of Manhattan.

at the golden door  

     How many liberties does it take to lift a lamp . . .

Ladies!

Kick off your Greco-Roman footwear!

Endow yourselves with waist
          
          hips
          bling
          billowing layers
          of colour   

pouty red lips 
messed mascara
the bosom of a bar wench

          faux pasties 
          in the shape of stars
          stars and more stars! 

Then we 
the tired homeless
will surely perk up

huddle in the folds 
of your skirts

          and wait

for your veil to part 
invite us in
promise what we seek:

that golden spot
of nirvanic lightlessness
we know is in there somewhere!

     . . . while a single tear rolls down your cheek?


*the title of the mural, as well as some language in the poem, is from Emma Lazarus', The New Colossus, which is cast in bronze inside the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty in New York. In 1883, Lazarus was asked to write a poem to help raise funds for the pedestal's construction and was motivated to do so primarily to show empathy for Jewish refugees who had been fleeing antisemitic pogroms in Eastern Europe.