El bello no ser de nuestros cuerpos/Our Bodies’ Beautiful Not Being: A reading
Sun, Dec 4, 2022
2 pm
Javier Orfón, Avispas (Wasp), detail of Bientevéo (Iseeyouwell), 2018–22. Inkjet print. Collection of the artist; courtesy Hidrante, San Juan.
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Floor 3, Theater
Nada (Nothingness)
If from not-being we come and toward not-being we go, nothing between nothing and nothing, zero between zero and zero, and if between nothing and nothing, there can be nothing, let us toast to our bodies’ beautiful not being.
—Julia de Burgos (translation by Raquel Salas Rivera)1
In her poem “Nada,” Julia de Burgos invites us to “toast to our bodies’ beautiful not being” in response to the argument that “life is nothingness.” This reading, curated by poet Raquel Salas Rivera, expands on the title of no existe un mundo poshuracán: Puerto Rican Art in the Wake of Hurricane María by inviting an intergenerational group of poets to address the ways in which Puerto Ricans continuously create from “nothingness,” making a life, a way forward, and even beauty, despite colonialism’s erasure and violence.
Readers include: Giannina Braschi, Rubén Ramos Colón, Nicole Cecilia Delgado, Francisco Félix, Denice Frohman, Joey de Jesús, Yara Liceaga, Roberto Ncar, Urayoán Noel, Mara Pastor, Willie Perdomo, Yolanda Arroyo Pizarro, Verónika Reca, Gaddiel Francisco Ruiz Rivera, Irizelma Robles, Sandra Nia Rodríguez, Edwin Torres, üatibirí, Xavier Valcárcel, and Elisabet Velásquez.
1. "Nada (Nothingness)" by Julia de Burgos, translated by Raquel Salas Rivera from I Am My Own Path / Yo Misma Fui Mi Ruta: A Bilingual Anthology of Julia de Burgos's Writing edited by Vanessa Pérez-Rosario. Copyright © 2024. Courtesy the University of Texas Press.
Generous support for El bello no ser de nuestros cuerpos/Our Bodies’ Beautiful Not Being: A reading for no existe is provided by the Mellon Foundation.
Nada
Si del no ser venimos y hacia el no ser marchamos, nada entre nada y nada, cero entre cero y cero, y si entre nada y nada no puede existir nada, brindemos por el bello no ser de nuestros cuerpos.
—Julia de Burgos
En su poema “Nada,” Julia de Burgos nos invita a que “brindemos por el bello no ser de nuestros cuerpos” y así responde al reclamo que “la vida es nada.” Esta lectura, curada por el poeta Raquel Salas Rivera, le da continuidad al título no existe un mundo poshuracán: Puerto Rican Art in the Wake of Hurricane María e invita a un grupo intergeneracional de poetas a examinar los modos en que les puertorriqueñes seguimos creando desde “la nada,” forjando una vida, una ruta hacia el futuro y hasta la belleza, pese a la invisibilización y la violencia del colonialismo.
Les poetas son Giannina Braschi, Rubén Ramos Colón, Nicole Cecilia Delgado, Francisco Félix, Denice Frohman, Joey de Jesús, Yara Liceaga, Roberto Ncar, Urayoán Noel, Mara Pastor, Willie Perdomo, Yolanda Arroyo Pizarro, Verónika Reca, Gaddiel Francisco Ruiz Rivera, Irizelma Robles, Sandra Nia Rodríguez, Edwin Torres, üatibirí, Xavier Valcárcel y Elisabet Velásquez.
Un generoso apoyo para El bello no ser de nuestros cuerpos/Our Bodies’ Beautiful Not Being: A reading for no existe es proporcionado por la Mellon Foundation.
