Christine Sloan Stoddard
Fine Artist • Brooklyn, NY
documentary
a camera emerges
from the palms
and conquers
its subject
no, not subject
object
another object
colonized
the dead girl artist’s scientific method
have you ever read
an artist statement
written by a cadaver?
imagine the photographer typing in her coffin
oh, you thought it was a man?
no, this dead artist is a woman
some might call her a girl
she is still willowy
not yet 30.
never pregnant,
free from the scars
that “make” a “woman”
actually, was
past tense
she’s just a buried body now
camera mechanics do not intoxicate me
but they enable me to
paint with light.
here in the darkness, I crave light
in life, I ate too many worms,
too much dirt.
all because he didn’t love me
i shouldn’t have cared
who was he but a ghostly distraction?
a skeletal character too mysterious
for me to add flesh
you must know a soul
to love it.
i photographed my sallow self before sunset
these were not expressionistic portraits
these were scientific documents,
photos for the lab and the archives
maybe a microscope could tell me
why he did not love me
I would crack the lens to find out
was it my curly hair?
did he long for straight?
was it my mayan nose?
did he want a ski slope?
was it my ripe olive tone?
did he prefer peaches and cream?
obsession does not make for
clear thinking
and my mind had always been
crystal.
i should’ve abandoned my lab coat
there are softer things to wear
why live with coarse fabrics?
life is coarse enough
i probed too hard with my camera
he doesn’t love you
i stabbed myself with my tripod
he doesn’t love you
i knocked myself out with studio lights
he doesn’t love you
an encouraging friend might say:
at least these unrequited affections
taught you photography
and now you can write
grant proposals from the grave
is that a nobler use of eternity
than pushing up daisies?
turning rejection and loneliness
into art?
now that I am dead,
my paranoia has died, too
he never loved me because
he never knew me.
no lab results necessary
daughter behind the lens
cameras lined the shelves like trophies
and press clippings hung on
his wood panel walls instead
of our family photos
the ghosts of success
the stink of pine
sunday mornings
doused in light and dew
i would worship his name
from the carpeted floor
stiff were the stains
stiff were my legs
my dolls baked like
my mother
they shopped like
my mother
they busied themselves
busy little women
barbies only ever owned
a point-and-shoot
for photo albums
never seen beyond home
their creations
were not
baptized creations
you are the professional
mama told papa
you are the professional
i made my own photo albums
mummified them
in butterfly stickers
but weren’t those photo albums
just like barbie’s?
pretty pretty pretty
papa’s photos were
never pretty
was i allowed to be like papa?
asking scared me
i touched papa’s
cameras in secret
the way you steal
a stroke of the altar
unrequited pixels
the weight of a camera
feeds my hungry hands
i can feel the lens breathe
and the shutter beat
like a prudent heart
photography is slow
to love me
but my love races
through valleys
and up mountains
to golden vistas
pining is my pace
my philosophy
i wake up in love
i fall asleep in love
and i shoot in love
my memory card
carries portraits
and landscapes
from my soul
to the world
i do not take photos
i give them
as i always give
in love
recuerdos
mama has no photographs
of her life
from before
she says her mind is
a wicked camera
high school photographer
playtime is soul food
for the teenage heart
portraits of rebellion
are requisite art projects
youth is fleeting
like photography
hold the camera
same as a cigarette
portraits of friends
humans make contracts
with other humans
but we are animals
who also devour
contracts and spit
them in the woods
paper pulp
carpets the soil
like moss
forget honor
forget clauses
forget policies
signatures are invalid
with beasts
roaming the land
i hold up the camera
and beckon you
to smile
but you can bare
your teeth
any way you choose
the story of a disappeared photo
when mama was 20 years old
papa took a photo of her
on a coffee plantation
but i never saw it
the photo was just
another ghost
photo sniffing
my camera seeks
crooked teeth
chapped lips
capillaries
humans are
more photogenic
than cyborgs
maker
i envelop toys and trash
with clay
spinning cocoons
from found objects
then i take up
camera and tripod
and march into battle
the battle for moments
the battle for magic
what stories will
i make today?
plant a flag
and capture
the narrative
drama can be small
tiny even
tiny as a spider’s eye
i take after insects
and arachnids
i am the hive
the hill
the web
the lens
is my soul
and my exoskeleton
bfa
the tapping of pencils
in the great hall
drums out all serenity
from the brain
think about your
future
my camera is my heart
think about your
life
my camera is my soul
but you have a stomach
feed your stomach
the relentless grip of
societal expectations
could shatter
the skull
i filled out that green
index card
and wrote ‘photography’
on the long black line
my major decision was
not so major
right?
the lens obsessed
do not choose
medicine or law
business will not do
dentistry is a cavity
in an artist’s heart
we choose the path
that could kill us
pull the trigger
and bang!
goes the camera
ready, set,
shoot
four years and
a diploma
four years and
a portfolio
four years and
nobody knows
what is next
millennial debt
papa studied at the top
photography school in the country
when tuition was $4,000 a year
but a bfa costs more
than that now
blue lust
i would photograph
a field full of indigo
if i knew where to find one
banana republic
central america
reagan in a new role
cameras everywhere
yet so much unseen
papa kissed izalco
but he wouldn’t tell
secrets lost in
obsolete broadcast
technology
my secrets are digital
camera for company
do not bring cameras to parties
people want freedom in
their tomfoolery
speaking of toms
peeping toms are
never popular
cameras are for
weirdos
shutterbugs are
weirdos
freshman fifteen
is not a shutter speed
play with your lenses
in your dorm room
you have the same date
every saturday
photography wears
a red dress
mothering
mama says
that learning photography
could be a useful skill
to teach my children
one day
womb/eye
the darkroom was
my red home
my red body
my red dreams
crimson water is
a window
and a door
make a picture
make a life
the dorm felt too blue
my eyes were set
for low light
never take a picture
give a picture
this freshman found
refuge in art
beauty is the
perfect sweater
even when it
begins to pill
beauty is
solitude in
the darkroom
parties are imperfect
but you can perfect
a photograph
i became the camera eye
and curled up
in portfolios
i became contact sheets
taped to the wall
i became that image
that burns
his grasp
when he seized my camera
his tongue tore my throat
and my lens cracked
snap a line
snap a life
glass cuts us all
professor dearest
my photos are a poor image
filled with noise
more noise than
my body can muster
soft hums beneath
the crushing weight
of film canisters
or is it grain?
the grain is insane
let’s make a movie
we have a flair for trauma
our ghosts will line up
for the picture show
violence is noise
violence is grain
i have loved cinema
since girlhood
almost as much as
i thought i loved you
don’t touch me
this camera is mine
i can frame a portrait
i am the portrait
the portrait is me
a model model
my back arches
my shoulders drop
my tongue saddles
the roof of my mouth
posed
poised
i am pleasure
i am spectacle
nude photos pay for college
cleavage for a textbook
nipples erect
tripod erect
the camera devours me
in the computer lab
i feast on pixels
square by square
wrinkles
freckles
moles
flabs
gone
my mind remains
it always remains
even if only
i see it
unwritten job description
women are photo editors
they edit work by the masters
women do not shoot
because cameras are guns
and we cannot have girls
playing with guns
exhibit
white walls cracked
in strange places
from hammers
and nails
unknown
behold
the vacuum
behold
the cave
i am here to revive you
so breathe
whispers grow into
endless echoes
failure
fail now
fail forever
failure incarnate
the gallery haunts
and taunts me
my studio cowers
and my inner child
weeps from
the floor
all i have to do
is build a kingdom
by myself
heaven is a photograph
i am never victorious
except behind the camera
and even then i pray
the atheist who turns
her eyes toward god
resume terror
art school broke my heart
a heart that shattered
and became dust
that blew away
in the wind
am i the heart?
am i the shards?
am i the dust?
am i the wind?
am i…
am i…
am i…
am i what
the job description
demands?
art school never taught me
how to write a resume
art school never taught me
how to assemble
a corporate portfolio
only a curiosity cabinet
of strange images
open this door
open this drawer
look
see
i made this
and now i have to craft myself
into someone marketable
or something marketable
marketability is not human
i shouldn’t put down art modeling
if i put it down
they will put it down
nobody needs to know
how i made money
only that i need money
hence the job application
the pRoFeSsIoNaL website
so ~professional~
look
see
i made this
i did
thanks to
many youtube tutorials
the resume
forget it
such a stretch
it’s rubber
the cover letter
rambling
more than a tumbleweed
then the job application form
wow
wow
how is this life?
‘summarize your experience’
artist since birth
never by choice
no, artist by force
artist by circumstance
or maybe better
creator out of stubbornness
maker out of necessity
i don’t know if you care
about my experience
but i can take (and give)
photographs
‘name your top skills’
see previous
‘list 5 words that describe you’
1. timid
2. secretive
3. yearning
4. resourceful
5. imaginative
submit
yeah
i’ve done that before
i’d rather not again
www.
my father says he does not need
a website
because people know him
on reputation alone
i cannot pay $300 a year
for the portfolio builder
an alum from my program
recommended at a panel
He had his own studio
and drank coconut water
He had a website, too
waiting like a virgin
i take photos
invisible to all but me
and maybe my laptop
if my laptop is a sentient being
i hope the photos
make him feel
or her feel
or them feel
i do not know my laptop’s
preferred pronoun
i only know that no human
has seen my photographs
for centuries
no eyes touch them
so they remain pure
or some christian bullshit
i am not pure
i have seen
i keep seeing
i want to see
i rot from waiting
come see
please see
see me
how to see
my instagram followers don’t miss me
they drop off
one by one
because i stopped posting my soul
even when i posted my soul
they looked
but i’m not convinced they saw
and a photographer needs
eyes that see
their own eyes
and the eyes of others
especially the eyes that
know how to see
a gift i guess
when i graduated from art school
my father gave me a photograph
one of his photographs
a photograph from the war
but i never hung it on the wall
papa, i will hang up my own
photograph on the wall
war
when papa photographed death
he sought out despair
i want to photograph
the hope that
refuses death
interview attack
hopeless is the girl on her bed
holding her camera
instead of a pillow
hopeless is the girl on her bed
too anxious to take
a single photograph
the camera falls asleep
the sd card falls asleep
the girl does not
anxiety is a thief
hopeless is the girl on her bed
wondering how much
she can get for her ratty thongs
her panties are worth
more than
her photographs
the internet is a thief
i am the girl on the bed
or i was
then a weekly newspaper editor called me
and asked
if i had
chased ambulances before
when i said no
he asked
would you?
i said it depended on how fast
the ambulance was going
then he told me i took good photos
but was everything staged?
i said mostly
i like building my own theaters
he said
journalism is not staged
so there will be no more staging
if i hire you
i said
i still set the frame
and he was quiet
his first pause
before he asked
if i would come to the office
next week
i said i wouldn’t mind
and i tried not to sound excited
excitement became panic
over the course of one slow week
and i wondered if my camera could feel
how hard my heart
beat everyday
as i stayed in bed
not going to the studio
or the gallery
or anywhere at all
i had my portfolio printed in a binder
i had my slim laptop in my bag
my portfolio already pulled up
i had them on me as i walked
into the newspaper office
i don’t remember the interview
only the dizziness
the daze and haze
of repeating a script
and hoping my photos
could speak better than i could
and then i remember getting the job
and i stopped rotting away in my bed
girl with job
clock in
clock out
there’s a lot i left out
just know i brought my camera
everywhere
across land and sea
framing photos for pages
framing photos for the ages
employable/lovable
papa called me to congratulate me
after mama told him i got the job
when i got angry at mama
she didn’t understand
but you’re a photographer now
she said
i was always a photographer
i said
but now you’re a professional
you have a career
something to do until you
find a husband
i said
i love my camera
and hung up the phone
the undead
journalists are zombies
i eat the brains of sources
and take stills from
their memories
never 9-to-5
sometimes i still see
his body
over my body
trauma has no
time card
i didn’t have a camera
then
but my memory is
photographic
it’s a burden i carry
like gear on the job
mfa admissions
anguish
apply
wait
receive
review
weigh
accept