Exquisite Corpse and a New Year
On the last day of the year, the teenager and I sat at 20 First Ave, drafting an exquisite corpse, collaborating without revealing, well maybe a line or two, riffing on the news one party invitee couldn't come because his landlady broke her ankle, eating noodles and a banh mi sandwich, the traditional delicious crusty french roll piled with seitan slices, cooked in garlic, pickled vegetables and fresh herbs, like we had years ago in Hanoi, flipping the pages to conceal our secret text. Soon enough, Brennan joined us, carrying a book of black and white Man Ray photos of a once emergent surrealist movement in Paris, dreams that blurred, but never faded. Off we walked to Village Works, saying thanks for the books and friends, and Washington Square Park, greeting Tina, back to Bijans to meet Al on Hoyt, to Barely Disfigured on Smith, where the boys are back from CDMX, toasting to the new with Baby C and the college kid, back to Bar Tobac, for our traditional dinner, escargot and smile, out to parties and dancing at Jean Francious', chatting with friends from everywhere, comrades from Sarajevo, with stories of the war, and merging into the night with the party people. The invite with address arrived late:
“hi darlings, it's time to MERGE INTO 2025, and we're PUMPED to break in a new space in a very familiar to MERGE location. pls call your vehicles to The Lot Radio (17 Nassau Ave, Brooklyn, NY…you'll see a black industrial gate and one of our lovely guards will usher you through. the party is now sold out…everyone is welcome at merge, but merge might not be for everybody. please take a moment to review and ensure alignment with our ethos and policies below.
Ethos: merge is a queer party that aims to cultivate sonic liminoid experiences through techno music. we will work together to incubate the collective queer body and experience its transformation under the influence of techno. we seek release, mutual understanding, deeper access to the personal, interconnected, and ethereal. we honor the sound through dance, self expression, and hyper-immersion.”
With a thump and beat, fog machine blowing through the air, strange yellow light in the ambient room, bodies moved, brains tingled. We danced and found a couch to sit for a minute. A man stumbled upon the seat by us.
“Should I take acid?” he asked.
“I don’t know. If you have a very supportive crew with you, then sure. It all depends on the drug, set and setting,” I found myself replying, sounding like grandpa.
“Do you like ketamine?” he asked.
“Not for me.”
I’ve had some bad trips, thinking about the Yage Letters between William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg about their trips into the forest, the hallucinations which won’t let go, the cycles through time, the death instinct repeated, descent to the depths, followed by life, and an eternal circle. He wandered off. Looked like there was a lot of ketamine about. This was not one of those nights for me. Instead we danced, new friends swinging about us, everyone moving, eyeballs bulging, genders blurring, bodies swirling, along with desires and beats, till it was time to go, making our way through the New Years night, laughing at the ridiculousness, sprinting as we missed the G train, on our way back into 2025!!!
In bed by 3 am... up by 10 am... we greeted the new years, the kids' hair springing in all directions as we drank coffees. They shared stories about their night, playing shows till midnight, mosh pit in motion, another party, strange encounters with old high school friends, deep in Brooklyn, strange boys, oddballs, people they’ve known, characters along the way.
Noon, friends were jumping out of bed, meeting on the f train, Lower East Side at Delancey. I’m stepping on at the front train at Carroll Street. I see Andrew’s face as the train stop. On i walk, greeting chums, riding to Mermaid Ave, hello Virginia at Ruby’s, Yana by the Ferris Wheel, springing into the water, greeting the crisp new years, crisp and chili, friends everywhere, families in the water, smiling, taking snapshots, new day, cold bathing suits, birds flying about, walking along the boardwalk, to the water, running into friends from near and far, eating at Tatiana's, chatting about existential threats and drug overdoses, terror in New Orleans, a car careening through Bourbon Street, screams, mangled bodies, hate, hopefully not reverberating, still echoing. I hope we are not moving to political violence. Andrew reads from James Balwin and Fire Next Time, with its Serenity Prayer, meditations on accepting and rejecting things as they are, and the wisdom to know the difference. What we can influence and what we can’t, knowing when to act, reading Leonard Cohen poems. He left before the last Trump moment. And now, we’re in it again. And so are his words to remind us to stand up, and live, despite the it all:
“i would like to remind
the management
that the drinks are watered
and the hat-check girl
has syphilis
and the band is composed
of former ss monsters
However since it is
new year's eve
and i have lip cancer
i will place my
paper hat on my
concussion and dance”
Yana, with stuff for two months of travel, was off to New Orleans.
And we made our way through the magic light, past the Aquarium.
On the train careened back to Carroll Street for movies and more stories, meditating on living, changing times, bodies splashing in the water, the light in our faces, time passing and friends being there as we get older, greetings 2025!!!
