Photo by Matt Meneely
We’re excited to welcome Linsday Lerman to The Oddments Tray. Lindsay is a writer and translator based in Richmond, Virginia. She holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Guelph and her recent translations include works by François Laruelle. She also has a cat named Supergirl and has lived in Istanbul. I'm From Nowhere is her first novel.
Excerpt from "I’m from nowhere"
She can see his smile in her head. She can hear his voice. Claire. Come here. Hi beauty. Singing to her: Old black hen, is that you again, singing the bad luck lullabye? Taunting her: Claire-o Claire-o little bear-o, show me your lovely teeth.
Will there be a time when she won’t be able to remember his voice, his smile, his face? His hands.
She’s here in this place—this place where he is not—and she is a widow. She has no husband. She has no job. She has no children. She’s useless, she knows it. She lives in this tunnel of wind and sun and neverending vistas. A fly between the screen and the glass, she thinks.
---
Disaster. The long, slow disaster of life in the Anthropocene.
Will a sinkhole open up and swallow them up? Will those starving in the Southern Hemisphere come for them and their food? Will the vast fields of greenhouses collapse under the weight of a massive multi-day hailstorm? Will those in power decide it’s no longer worth the effort to keep the rest alive?
But we don’t think of it much she and everyone else knows. Mostly it’s beyond our comprehension. We just live our fragile lives. Husbands die and wives grieve and it’s the same as it’s always been.
The canned food isn’t too bad. The air quality isn’t unbearable. The summer heat is painful, but it’s sort of always been that way anyway. It’s beyond fixing--all of it--so why bother with anything but a shrug in response? Same as it’s always been.
(written by Lindsay Lerman, read by Chioke I'Anson)
The lyrics from Songs: Ohia's "The Old Black Hen" are reprinted by kind permission from the estate of Jason Molina.
That rad music you hear at the end is by Tigerrosa. Buy their debut album here
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