My Body Is Crying Blood

by Diane Wittner / April 19th, 2008

This brief piece is dedicated to magical realist writers Arundhati Roy, Toni Morrison and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. It is also an artistic statement of a small life drawing.

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Each day I try to revel in all live bodies’ unending miracles. Yet still I don’t know how to shape a language that would tell my open-mouthed awe for the nerve links, the tiny electric intertwining of my ideas, sentiments and my entire cell structure, my corporeal self.

Others have successfully shown their worship of our bodies in activism, in spiritual practice, in art, and in joyful and generous living. These manifold expressions sustain me when I feel well and when I am ill.

And so it is with a mixture of worry and admiration — for my own body — that just after March 19th (start of the sixth year of the US occupation of Iraq) and April 15th (war tax deadline), I woke up to find my body crying blood.

I have secretly been awaiting this physical manifestation of my intensifying sorrow, and it has at last arrived.

As choreographer Martha Graham said, “The body reveals what words cannot.”

Diane Wittner is an artist, teacher, and director of Chesapeake Citizens. Read other articles by Diane, or visit Diane's website.

This article was posted on Saturday, April 19th, 2008 at 6:30 am and is filed under Academic Freedom, Culture, General.

28 comments on this article so far ...

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  1. Lloyd Rowsey said on April 19th, 2008 at 6:36 am #

    Venal & Sons has at last published the long-awaited first volume of Metterling’s laundry lists (The Collected Laundry Lists of Hans Metterling, Vol 1, 437 pages., xxxii page Introduction; indexed; $18.75), with an erudite commentary by the noted Metterling scholar Gunther Eisenbud.

  2. evie said on April 19th, 2008 at 7:04 am #

    That’s funny Lloyd.

    Happily, my body can no longer cry blood. And I have the hot flashes to prove it.

  3. Lloyd Rowsey said on April 19th, 2008 at 7:15 am #

    :-) It’s from Woody (Allen). I’d planned to wait for DV’s next book review, but what-the-hey, we may all be dead by that time.

  4. Diane Wittner said on April 19th, 2008 at 8:55 am #

    I look forward to seeing if others interpret the piece the same way you each did. ;-)

  5. evie said on April 19th, 2008 at 10:17 am #

    Diane
    I love the smell of esoteric in the morning. ;)

  6. hp said on April 19th, 2008 at 10:42 am #

    “You are not the body.”
    Swami Prabhupada.

  7. evie said on April 19th, 2008 at 10:55 am #

    I’ll take $400 Alec. What is a nightmare?

  8. maha said on April 19th, 2008 at 5:19 pm #

    Are you all nuts? And where’s that biggest fruitcake of them all crying out anti-semitism?

  9. Don Hawkins said on April 19th, 2008 at 6:07 pm #

    Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible player. Albert Einstein

  10. maha said on April 20th, 2008 at 4:18 am #

    yeah, einstein danced alright when he stole other people’s ideas and called them his own. And even though up to date measurements no longer match “his” theory they still persist. why? because we’re not allowed to know the truth..

  11. Don Hawkins said on April 20th, 2008 at 9:40 am #

    Einstein’s stuff was taken by today’s scientists and more has been learned in just the last 25 years than the last 1000 years. There is a little battle going on think of it as a war. Knowledge verses matrixland or dream land. Here is only one example and that is the Earth is 4.5 billion years old not 6 thousand years old. Is there a create tor? I would think so but has nothing to do with the age of this planet.

  12. hp said on April 20th, 2008 at 12:41 pm #

    It takes MahaVishnu 311 trillion years to take one breath. The life of Brahma.

  13. Don Hawkins said on April 20th, 2008 at 1:52 pm #

    Wait one little minute here HP. Are you saying time and space was here before the big bang? Oh yes probably and I am sure has kept Steven Hawking thinking late at night.

  14. hp said on April 20th, 2008 at 3:30 pm #

    Which big bang?
    Hawking is a theorist. Remember?

  15. hp said on April 20th, 2008 at 3:34 pm #

    ‘When I read the Bhagavad Gita and reflect about how God created this universe, everything else seems so superfluous.’
    Einstein

    I suggest the Srimad Bhagavatam.

  16. Don Hawkins said on April 20th, 2008 at 4:06 pm #

    Alright I will read this.

  17. Don Hawkins said on April 20th, 2008 at 4:55 pm #

    Completely rejecting all religious activities which are materially motivated, this Bhāgavata Purāṇa propounds the highest truth, which is understandable by those devotees who are fully pure in heart. The highest truth is reality distinguished from illusion for the welfare of all. Such truth uproots the threefold miseries. This beautiful Bhāgavatam, compiled by the great sage Vyāsadeva [in his maturity], is sufficient in itself for God realization. What is the need of any other scripture? As soon as one attentively and submissively hears the message of Bhāgavatam, by this culture of knowledge the Supreme Lord is established within his heart.
    Thanks a lot HP it looks like a few weeks of reading I’ll be back.

  18. Diane Wittner said on April 21st, 2008 at 6:22 am #

    Whew! Online discussions at DV sure are high end! If I may shift the discourse, I humbly request that you write and then post here your own magic realist comment. My suggested guidelines: your piece should have 1) the title ‘My Body is Crying Blood” 2) seven sentences, as seven can symbolize balance, completion and perfection….and, 3) our global war economy as its underlying theme. Magic realist writers have been described by some literary critics as representing ‘the other.’ Tempted anyone?

  19. Annie said on April 21st, 2008 at 7:07 am #

    Huh?

  20. Lloyd Rowsey said on April 21st, 2008 at 6:26 pm #

    I think she meant “here” at Dissident Voice, Annie. But I don’t have a clue whether Diane’s next submission to them will be “published” by DeeVee.

  21. evie said on April 21st, 2008 at 6:56 pm #

    Gosh Diane, I’ll have to pass. I haven’t dabble in magic realism in years and years, not since smoking maui owie with my best friend in the Rocky Mountains and taking reeds down to the stream to weave baskets - I kid you not.

  22. Lloyd Rowsey said on April 21st, 2008 at 9:00 pm #

    Whoaaaaa. I just noticed Diane’s posts carry the immaculate “DV” logo and coloring! Maybe I’m spaced out, but have ALL authors had this dispensation in the past, and I just overlooked it, or do we now have FOUR editors to abuse?

    Evie. I have to admit I agree almost completely with the disparaging comments following your admission that you have children wearing the uniforms of private contractors in the Allnewballgame. Moreover, I’m proud that MY child would rather be hung for a sheep than a lamb, and IF he’s selling out, he’s not pussy-footing with some confused progressive/private trip, but going right to the heart of the beast — Hollyfuckingwood!!

  23. evie said on April 21st, 2008 at 9:15 pm #

    Lloyd
    You lost me, private contractors? sheep/lamb? progressive/private trip? heart of the beast?

  24. Lloyd Rowsey said on April 21st, 2008 at 9:25 pm #

    Sorry sorry. Another thread, but surely you haven’t forgot, evie? Your reposte to my comment about how America’s returning its uniformed warriors from abroad would be worse than its decades of furthering the immigration of the richest and most accomplished from countries all over the planet that moved leftward? Your reposte pointing out that you have a bush pilot son in Alaska, and another offspring doing remunerated progressive work elsewhere?

    You didn’t actually say they were wearing uniforms, I just gave you credit for making your reposte “four-square” with my complaint.

    Evidently, we have giant political differences too, evie, if you think Hollywood is a force for progressive change in this country, or ever has been.

  25. Lloyd Rowsey said on April 21st, 2008 at 9:35 pm #

    Sorry sorry again. What you posted, evie, was:

    “Now Lloyd, my 4 children in uniform do not identify themselves with killing civilians. In fact, 2 are in real estate development with their wives and doing okay, 1 plans on being a bush pilot in Alaska for ritzy tourists, and another plans on retiring to a Zacatecas hacienda and work his in-laws ranch.

    The hard rain is gonna fall on all those who, in and out of uniform, have bellyached the past 8 years but didn’t procure an umbrella, b/c they believe the government will give them one.”

    Beneath James Petras’ April 18 article.

  26. Lloyd Rowsey said on April 21st, 2008 at 9:41 pm #

    But most sorry sorry you have such a sorry opinion of people who couldn’t afford to “procure an umbrella, b/c they believe the government will give them one.” evie, sweetie.

    Sheeeeesh.

  27. evie said on April 22nd, 2008 at 4:26 am #

    Well geese Lloyd, if more people/corporations were independent of government give aways maybe they would not be afraid of getting off their fat butts and challenging the system. Too many people gripe about government but expect it to take care of them, a nation of adolescents.

    My children, two are Army, two are Marine Corp, 18 years in, 15 years in, 5 years in, 6 years in. Bush pilot, hacienda, etc. are their plans after getting out of the military. Three of my daughters-in-law are Mexican nationals - that’s the son retiring from military to live/work in Zacatecas on in-laws ranch.

    Your original post bleated the tired idea of returning troops from Iraq were somehow going to be a threat to the rest of us. As if anyone in uniform likes killing. Most are going to be productive citizens.

  28. Annie said on April 22nd, 2008 at 3:35 pm #

    I said…Huh?

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