Blackouts

by Justin Torres

“Darling, the only thing anyone should be embarrassed about is taking themselves too seriously. Anyway, isn’t that what mystery is? Your blackouts, these erasures? Frustration as art?”

More often … the urge to document and the urge to disappear, though contradictory, are fused. —HEATHER LOVE, Underdogs

And the song is a lament, something camp and bluesy, about how there ain’t no shame in being a bitch, but, Lord, be a bitch that barks.

In our attachments, whether to objects or others, there exists a continual fluctuation of our energies. We wish to possess, to be possessed, and to be relieved of our possessions all at once. The hoarder solves the problem of value and attachment by holding on. The chronic loser lets it all go.

Explaining away the “bad father” and redirecting us toward the “good enough father” is so often one of a mother’s covert responsibilities.

“Do you know why we fetishize, nene? To survive our own ambivalence. Perhaps the chains, and especially the crucifix, became totems, able to absorb both hatred and desire. Perhaps in their glimmer and weight you saw a reflection of all that you wanted, and all that you feared.”