Soul Stones by Tatyana Carney

This is a video that I made about Tatyana Carney's poem Soul Stones. I used this for a later project too, so I'll talk about those edits on the next page. This is the first version that I turned in, which was then later edited. Some of my challenges with this first one was that I had to chose a poem, and we were told that it should be 3 to 4 minutes long. To me, that of course meant a long poem, but I didn't realize that because we would be making a video of it, the video would be about twice as long as if the poem was just spoken. I quickly realized that I got more than I bargained for with this poem...

Soul Stones

We swallow boulders:
(lead words, molasses covered prejudice, glass shards of promises long broken)

Mouths open wide and heads tipped back
like Hawaiian fire eaters.

Chipped teeth are bits of porcelain history,
sliding down our throats in rivers of neglect
and acid.

The stones settle,

BOOM...

     BOOM...

           BOOM...

Our stomachs are filled up, anvil weight
'till we can hardly sit, hardly stand, or walk.

We drag our feet in pain, as the quiet indicator that
we've had rocks for breakfast,
lunch, dinner,  for years,
in the hopes that someone will recognize
the broken concrete footprints behind us
and touch us gently on the forearm:

"Honey, are you alright?"

(and isn't it the first sweet trickle of kind words that crumble
the already cracking facade?)

There's no stopping the torrent then,
tsunami tears and a heaving, convulsing
to the point of cathartic vomit-

boulders of every shape and size
tumbling out of our mouths and filling the room;
broken teeth and granite eyes
until we no longer see the floor, the walls...

And then serenity.

The hand has moved to the shoulder,
forming a universal hug.

"I'm here now... and you're ok."

We stand up, together, and leave that room,
a soundless void of yesterday,
to absorb the impermeability of stones,
carrying our gait buoyant, without gravity.

No weight at all now, and barely a second glance,

but to turn out the light - and lock the door behind us...