like animals at night

Lila

i crouched and extended my hand, and she walked slowly toward me. she touched her pink nose to my fingertips, then pressed her soft head to my hand. when she seemed ready, i stroked her head. she was calm, and the room was quiet, the early december sky white. i'd stepped out of my car to the first snow of winter, the lightest of dustings, barely there. now, in the room, i asked the foster mom if she wouldn't mind skipping the adoption event she was planning to take the grey-and-white cat to the next day. 

that night, i went to the bunker for the first time. it was a season of crisis for me, and, after meeting lila, i'd spent the day attending to one. emotionally stirred, i let the walk to 222 bowery gentle me. i rode waves of aching as i sat alone in the audience, writing in my journal, looking around. the bunker was the home of john giorno, a poet with a deep commitment to buddhism who was part of the downtown new york art world from his mid-20s til his death in 2019 at the age of 82. he lived at the bunker that whole time, holding parties and readings and concerts in the roomy space, letting buddhist monks set up a shrine and hold meditations. "his loft quickly became a gathering place for the punks and poets of new york," the history section of giorno's website says. i get the sense that the space was important to a lot of people. it is becoming important to me, too. 

i went for a screening of the andy warhol film sleep, which stars john giorno. watching it is like watching a painting that slowly, subtly moves and morphs, like jeremy blake's digital paintings. it's footage of john sleeping for five hours. the bunker screened it for two nights, the first time it was shown in the city in decades, as a fundraiser for the film co-op. i went on the second night, and someone noted to me that a man in the front row had been there both nights and never taken his eyes off the screen. ten hours. i stayed til the end, alternately talking to people, writing, listening to the music playing, and watching the film. the film co-op had encouraged people to socialize, saying warhol intended the film to be screened this way, as a backdrop to music and talking. people should do whatever they want while it's on, he had said, according to the introducer. i was interested in talking to the man who'd watched the film for the entire ten hours, but i didn't dare -- whatever state he'd attained by the end of that second screening, i didn't want to disturb. 

walking home that night, i felt clear, clean. different. when i left after my second visit, i felt that way even more.

Leidy Churchman, Rainbow Tigle (2024) 

the second visit was for something called a dark meditation, led by a painter and their teacher, a buddhist practitioner who once served as the chaplain for the nyc department of corrections. they spoke softly and carefully. a new painting by the painter hung up behind them -- an empty circle surrounded by rings of rainbow colors -- reminded me of hilma af klint's paintings, both in style and intent: using painting as a way to map spirit. the painter described themself as "not a perfectionist," which is something i drew inspiration from when sitting down to write this blog post. i've been putting it off, wanting to do justice to these experiences. remembering what the painter said, i remember i don't need to put so much pressure on myself. 

a painter friend of mine was there, too, someone i was glad to see after quite some time. we caught up before the meditation began. they're currently painting in a studio in the world trade center. 

i didn't know what a dark meditation was. i thought they'd dim the lights and we'd meditate in the near-dark. i did not know that a dark meditation takes place in the blackest black i've consciously experienced outside of the womb. just, full on dark. no difference between your eyes open or closed. and silent. 

when they shut off the lights, i felt panicked. i closed my eyes, not feeling able to face the total darkness just yet. closing my eyes, i felt better. i breathed and slowly relaxed. the painter had said that the tibetan buddhist approach to breathing in meditation is to just breathe very naturally. so i did this, just breathed as i normally would. and i calmed down. i vacillated between telling myself it would be over soon and appreciating the pure space of time i'd been plunged into. i thought to myself: i often feel pressed for time in my life in the city. in the dark, though, i really had nothing but time. nothing to attend to aside from breathing. nothing to see. no body, even, it felt like after a while. at the beginning, i felt comforted by the slight scraping of chairs i could hear, the clearing of throats. reminders i was surrounded by people and i wasn't in outer space or dead. but after a while, i stopped needing that. 

i decided to stay for the second session, mostly because no one else was leaving and i thought okay, we're all strapped in here. we're all doing this. the first session had been twenty minutes; the second session was forty. this time, after feeling the initial panic and breathing until it wore off, i was eventually able to open my eyes, and i kept my eyes open the rest of the time. 

it was drizzling when i left, and i walked home. i felt very aware of the taxis and the noise and the people, but not in a bad way. just felt like i was having a heightened sensory experience. when i got home, i locked my phone in its lockbox (it felt too bright to look at for long) and wrote a poem in my journal. 

Jersey

last night, i took a riding lesson for the first time in about ten years. i'd like to spend some time with horses this summer, so i'm reacquainting myself with how to ride them. 

it was so nice to be on a farm again; the smell of horses and hay grounds me so easily. my horse was a chestnut mare named jersey. climbing onto her and ambling along, i remembered how meditative an experience horseback riding is. in order to, like, be able to do it, you're forced to be present and take what comes: adjusting, melding, trying to let go of ego and fear. i wasn't very good at it. i fell off. but i got back on, and when i felt empty and relaxed, it was heaven. wrote afterwards: "sore now. but feel a sense of happiness and openness and rightness." 

currently reading: alice notley's "being reflected upon"