Unicorn Is My Gender
Since November 2009, I've been writing a cache (herd? posse? coven?) of top-secret poems about unicorns. This post contains a sneak preview!
But first here's a picture for you, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art collection:
Unicorn seal and impression from Indus Valley, ca. 2600–1900 BCE
The Indus Valley civilization, four thousand years old, was home to the world's earliest images of one-horned equines. Yes, it's true; unicorns were not invented by medieval Europeans. Or even Lisa Frank.
My unicorn research led me on an amazing expedition last month to Dholavira, one of the archaeological sites where hundred of unicorn images were unearthed in the 1990s. I'm also delving into sources as diverse as Audre Lorde, Aristotle, Lady Gaga, Jean Genet, and, er, Private Wealth magazine. Unicorn thinking, as I've come to conceptualize it, has also instigated many stunning journeys, internal and external—as well as startling coincidences too beautiful and numerous to outline here.
The first coincidence, though, is that when I began writing poems about unicorns, I didn't even know about the South Asia connection. In fact, I thought I was getting away from all that deep "roots" type writing that I'd just spent eight years focusing on; I thought it'd be fun to do something else for a change.
Very cute, universe!
Some of the qualities of unicorns, and unicorn thinking, that I've come to appreciate include surprise, journey, magic, purity (a difficult term), risk, depth, courage, borderlands, transcendence, queerness, transformation, femininity (another tough one), openness, vulnerability, intimacy (maybe the toughest!), and ecstasy.
I feel fortunate that many, many friends and acquaintances have indulged me by sending me unicorn links and sources and especially videos. The videos have inspired me to create—dare I say "curate"?—my first YouTube channel. From narwhals to Lady Gaga, from Disney cartoons to German feminism, the Unicorn Is My Gender channel offers you (ok, me) hours of unicorn viewing pleasure.
As this writing continues to unfold (a verb that makes me think of unicorn origami), I'm happy to share one of the poems in the sequence.
*
Operation Unicorn: Queries
For instance do they sleep standing
or kneel
as if worship, as if open mouth
or like fish rest in episodes unrecognizable to us
spinning
through what they breathe, emerald air?
Do they pant? eat/shit? Give birth in viscera
& bone,
hail, flame, all five elements harmonious as hellebore?
Who is their mother, their goddess, their
Eve? What
power do they honor above all?
Why have they come to us now?
*
Thanks Kristy Lin Billuni, Miriam Kronberg, Julius Paras, Jeff Stroker, Ann Ueda, Ravi Chandra, Irene Nexica, Nancy Kates, Nancy Netherland, Bhanu Kapil, Kuzhali Manickavel, Sueann Mark, Kabi Sherman, Kirthi Nath, the women of Hedgebrook, and many many others for pointing me toward unicorns. Keep em coming.
