Already Ancient

By the Time You Cut Teeth You Are Already Ancient: A meta-genealogical investigation/spiritual quest/cautionary tale

As of 2019, 29 million people have had their DNA tested. By the Time You Cut Teeth You Are Already Ancient is, in part, a meta-genealogical investigation that contemplates the psycho-socio-political implications of this phenomenon and serves as a meditation on the wonder and absurdity of the ways the cellular constitution of one’s spit — a body fluid most abject — can, not only serve as a portal to other times and places, but stimulate new narratives which alter subjective perceptions of self.

National lore and mythology originating in one’s ancestral stomping grounds can inform the perceived purpose of one’s life, as “the self,” in identification and sympathy with one’s ancestors permeates boundaries of time and space. What happens when a substantial portion of the population suddenly discovers heroes, barbarians, princes, paupers, and sworn enemies sitting on the same branch of the family tree? How will the past inform the future?

By the Time You Cut Teeth You Are Already Ancient

All at Once

While traveling in Ireland,

I saw the Cliffs of Moher.

I saw Killarney Lakes so blue.

I kissed the feet of Oscar Wilde and

donned his holey t-shirt.

I saw my mother

although I knew it was my father.

She was alive.

She was floating in the Liffey.

I saw my husband beheaded.

I raised an aqua vitae and swallowed a star.

I searched, and became, a dress of saffron.

It hid my child - no dress - a saint was he!

But off the cliff we were pushed willy

nilly.

I hung with pirates.

They left me their name.

(And I’ve been hanging ever since.)

I’m back in Prussia.

It is Pennsylvania.

We Neanderthals

will see

what we saw in 1972.

MDM 2018

Through a multi-disciplinary art practice as device for the compression of time, I hope to squish out pottery shards, striations on kerf walls, circuitry, breath...