Author's Corner - Wild Geese Audio Essay
India's Author's Corner - Audio Essay
Wild Geese & Loving Yourself
Our second real assignment was to create an audio essay. Inspired by works like Steph Ceraso's, I took the option of choosing a personally significant poem, Mary Oliver's "Wild Geese."
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
However, as many wise people have said, the personal can get political. Loving yourself when there are seven billion people and humanity is hurting nature can be hard. And loving yourself in a time of identity politics and shame agendas can be a little bit heroic.
I used three voices throughout. I did not want the author to read the piece because I felt it might block the absorption of the message. I preferred to use a peer our age with a gentler reading for the beginning, and brought it back to outside of me--to legitimize my conceit of giving advice--when I asked him what he thought self-love is. I used Mary Oliver's voice for "in-text" quotations, her voice as good as a citation. And then I spoke. After re-recording, the quality improved without losing the confessional feel of the words.
I was a little worried about the non-nature parts, but with a balance of one of my favorite soundtracks (Beasts of the Southern Wild) and some human noises (laughs, a crowd, echoing my voice) I think I could still get across some of the social/psychological concerns I was speaking of.
Overall this was probably my most successful project, partially because it was easier to manage one mode--audio--and partially because the prompt was nicely fitted to one poem, and a few experiences.
Here's a look at the file itself!
I had a great time doing our "training" by creating a mashup of hardcore ladies from pop culture plus a little Glitch Mob and Marina & the Diamonds! Listen below.
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