The Venus Hottentot (1825)<\/a><\/strong>
\nElizabeth Alexander<\/p>\n1. Cuvier<\/p>\n
Science, science, science!
\nEverything is beautiful<\/p>\n
blown up beneath my glass.
\nColors dazzle insect wings.<\/p>\n
A drop of water swirls
\nlike marble. Ordinary<\/p>\n
crumbs become stalactites
\nset in perfect angles<\/p>\n
of geometry I’d though
\nimpossible. Few will<\/p>\n
ever see what I see
\nthrough this microscope.<\/p>\n
Cranial measurements
\ncrowd my notebook pages,<\/p>\n
and I am moving closer,
\nclose to how these numbers<\/p>\n
signify aspects of
\nnational character.<\/p>\n
Her genitalia
\nwill float inside a labeled<\/p>\n
picking jar in the Musee
\nde l’Homme on a shelf<\/p>\n
above Broca’s brain:
\n“The Venus Hottentot.”<\/p>\n
Elegant facts await me.
\nSmall things in this world are mine.<\/p>\n
2.
\nThere is unexpected sun today
\nin London, and the clouds that
\nmost days sift into this cage
\nwhere I am working have dispersed.
\nI am a black cutout against
\na captive blue sky, pivoting
\nnude so the paying audience
\ncan view my naked buttocks.<\/p>\n
I am called “Venus Hottentot.”
\nI left Capetown with a promise
\nof revenue: half the profits
\nand my passage home: A boon!
\nMaster’s brother proposed the trip;
\nthe magistrate granted me leave.
\nI would return to my family
\na duchess, with watered-silk<\/p>\n
dresses and money to grow food,
\nrouge and powders in glass pots,
\nsilver scissors, a lorgnette,
\nvoile and tulle instead of flax,
\ncerulean blue instead
\nof indigo. My brother would
\ndevour sugar studded non-
\npareils, pale taffy, damask plums.<\/p>\n
That was years ago. London’s
\ncircuses are florid and filthy,
\nswarming with cabbage-smelling
\ncitizens who stare and query,
\n“Is it muscle? bone? or fat?”
\nMy neighbor to the left is
\nThe Sapient Pig, “The Only
\nScholar of His Race.” He plays<\/p>\n
at cards, tells time and fortunes
\nby scraping his hooves. Behind
\nme is prince Kar-mi, who arches
\nlike a rubber tree and stares back
\nat the crowd from under the crook
\nof his knee. A professional
\nanimal trainer shouts my cues.
\nThere are singing mice here.<\/p>\n
“The Ball of Duchess DuBarry”:
\nIn the engraving I lurch
\ntoward the belles dames, mad-eyed, and
\nthey swoon. Men in capes and pince-nez
\nshield them. Tassels dance at my hips.
\nIn this newspaper lithograph
\nmy buttocks are shown swollen
\nand luminous as a planet.<\/p>\n
Monsieur Cuvier investigates
\nbetween my legs, poking, prodding,
\nsure of his hypothesis.
\nI half expect him to pull silk
\nscarves from inside me, paper poppies,
\nthen a rabbit! He complains
\nat my scent and does not think
\nI comprehend, but I speak<\/p>\n
English. I speak Dutch. I speak
\na little French as well, and
\nlanguages Monsieur Cuvier
\nwill never know have names.
\nNow I am bitter and now
\nI am sick. I eat brown bread,
\ndrink rancid broth. I miss good sun,
\nmiss Mother’s sadza. My stomach<\/p>\n
is frequently queasy from mutton
\nchops, pale potatoes, blood sausage.
\nI was certain that this would be
\nbetter than farm life. I am
\nthe family entrepreneur!
\nBut there are hours in every day
\nto conjure my imaginary
\ndaughters, in banana skirts<\/p>\n
and ostrich-feather fans.
\nSince my own genitals are public
\nI have made other parts private.
\nIn my silence I possess
\nmouth, larynx, brain, in a single
\ngesture. I rub my hair
\nwith lanolin, and pose in profile
\nlike a painted Nubian<\/p>\n
archer, imagining gold leaf
\nwoven through my hair, and diamonds.
\nObserve the wordless Odalisque.
\nI have no forgotten my Xhosa
\nclicks. My flexible tongue
\nand healthy mouth bewilder
\nthis man with his rotting teeth.
\nIf he were to let me rise up<\/p>\n
from his table, I’d spirit
\nhis knives and cut out his black heart,
\nseal it with science fluid inside
\na bell jar, place it on a low
\nshelf in a white man’s museum
\nso the whole world could see
\nit was shriveled and hard,
\ngeometric, deformed, unnatural.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
One of the other good choices made by Obama’s inaugural planners was inviting Elizabeth Alexander to compose and deliver a poem. It’s not a well-established tradition. Only two other Presidents have featured poets at their inaugurations: John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton. And, of course, the mere mention of “poetry” gives folks an opportunity to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science-and-society","category-words"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2114\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/preposterousuniverse.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n