In the belly of things
a welcome letter to a new Swallow
the Belly
I am looking to un-fragment things—to honor fragments, actually. The act of documenting—can it resemble Relief? An architectural approach towards Body, not to restore, nor to bother returning to original shape, but instead to evolve with shape. To find beauty in fracture of shape. If I sew thread through Memory and Mess while holding rooms vacant for what is ongoing, maybe I can honor the in-between. Capture change without holding onto change. To face these things, I must place myself on a map, see myself in location. Maybe it’s that I want to be in a place of mind where the little I have experienced is enough to call a life. The alternative—experiencing the collapses in life as a concave lack (be it failure, loss, or the shattering of illusions)—is no longer viable. Backs are broken over having to prove they are something—over having to prove that they are indeed ‘backs.’ I do not wish to do that. Let this be a restorative corner of regurgitation, of imagination, then let her be left alone (translation = let that be plenty).
Frankly speaking, I have been both thrilled and terrified to share this project with you throughout the past year: to have witnessed how life takes hold of things, and to lose narrative while writing one.
Thank you for being a part of the process of undoing, of making then re-making.
The concept of Swallow had long been on my mind—for at least four years before its release—and wasn’t born until last year in March, 2022 with its first entry: The city and her aloneness. An excerpt:
I’ve long been haunted by the desire to make sense of my surroundings. Of then and now, of here and there. There’s this craving to crack open the landscape; to break it apart and see what’s inside. I imagine broken shells and egg yolks dripping down lips, I think of what it’s like to taste wet and sticky truths on tongues. To have also tasted things that are not true; moments of pain and raw confusion that, at first, have no taste at all.
Part of what pushed me to finally publish Swallow last March were elusive but ever-pressing feelings of alone-ness and confusion. One year later, those grey areas of uncertainty have a little more color and taste than they did before. This has helped me understand more of what the heart of Swallow is, what the publication can be, and why I continue to make it.
(about Wings)
I spent the majority of last year with someone who wasn’t with me even though he was. Maybe in this way F1 was like a shadow: always beside me but never fully there. I am here. He said as we left the ocean, as we left the mountains, climbed into the car and drove home, back to the center of city. I haven’t been able to concisely summarize for myself the many conflicting chapters that made up that story because I don’t know, and may never know, the whole truth of it.
A friend recently told me that “Lying is the taking away of someone else’s choice.” I’ve been trying to understand the basic Blueprints of why this hurts so much, and why this kind of thing can be so scary. The blue says: A lie hurts because somebody else has decided something for you, without your consent. Because somebody you love or respect is rendering you powerless, robbing you of agency. The print says: A lie is a reaction to fear, a means to counter the unknown. This is also another way to describe control.
The pain asks: but why didn’t I deserve the truth? The pain asks: but why were they willing to hurt me?
Fear and Pain can talk a good talk.
There were many things I didn’t—but wanted very badly to—understand about what I was experiencing in the varied stages of knowing and not knowing: Like: do trees lose their outline? And: how do I (re)draw what I believe in? The story I was living in was continuously shifting. As parts of the truth slowly came to light, each piece reclaimed its space in sharp, abrupt angles, where once stood gentler but more menacing, false substitutions. At the restaurant, on the street, in bedrooms, inside night clubs, and on train platforms: long hidden things spilled out. Words were tenuous and had grown twisted the longer they had been kept, like they didn’t know how to survive after being born into this rough draft of the world; one that was collapsing in on itself, blades of grass growing downwards, into the ground like roots, as if this was normal.
The question of Integrity was repeatedly overshadowed by the pressure of Time, an authority figure present from the onset, who would soon end everything regardless of what we chose to do with Trust. Ever constant was a sense of perseverance to prove that there was love, or something like it between us. There was rarely a moment to myself to access Calm. I was discouraged from being close enough to my feelings to know them—at times was made to doubt their existence or validity, especially when I asked questions about what was real and what was not. Do branches grow leaves, or do leaves cling to branches?
There were moments throughout last year when I wondered if what this project needed, and what I needed, was to just unfold—to be out in the open with the fractures—after spending so long in several different shades of Small. Beginning Swallow was my way of drawing wings on my back. I’ve come to understand that when cast in somebody else’s story, sometimes we are assigned the role of having none. Maybe Authors forget to draw wings on our backs because we are secondary characters. Or, maybe Authors intentionally erase them to keep us from flying elsewhere. Either way, for the wingless it’s not always possible to draw wings on our own. In some cases this is because we believe we must earn them, or because we don’t yet know how to assign them to ourselves. It must also be said that there are cases when the wingless draw wings on their backs, but there are no windows to fly through, up and out of.
Swallow is a floatation device; a harbor that was built for this reason—in an attempt to locate self, story, and truth among unraveling narratives that weren’t made for me. I asked: real or not real? and was swallowed by the question. Guided by Memory and Location, but especially by simple words of my own, I was able to re-meet myself again and again in the belly of things. Simple words made for resurfacing: I am tired, and: This tree has changed shape.
on Chapters
I have lived in Japan now for over 9 years, and many things have changed since I first decided to move here for what is still an undecided amount of time. Navigating Temporary and Unknown for the length of time that I have has led me to think about how we define Time and Place, and the degree of influence this has on our lives. Both on the real and the not real things. What do we do when the unanswerable swallows our ‘knowing?’ And how do we honor being in the belly as we stumble around inside it?
It’s my hope that the humanness and nakedness of Swallow makes readers feel a little less alone. With each entry, I want to reaffirm that normal is Myth, that Messy is probably beauty and we just don’t fully know it. I want to share the work because I want to rid myself and others of the pervasive notions of perfectionism, shame (& Co.) that keep us immobilized in places of pain. And I want to contribute to what documentation and narrative can look like—a moment, or a sketch of a moment that was likely important to you; something you can present on your own terms, at your own pace, and in your own way. Let there be nuance, disappointments, insignificance, and mistakes. Let things be raw and metabolizing, and let them be for you.
The big news is that Swallow is going paid. That means this project will be offered with more frequency, and with more mediums behind the paywall. If you find value in my work, consider becoming a paid subscriber to get the full experience: access to all entries and mediums; audio narration that accompanies written work, & the publication of art projects that I grow here in Tokyo. This includes a four-years-long poetry project that will be released later this week.
Supporting my work supports me. Writing and making things is what I do, and contributions remind me that I can and should continue this journey to honor what is created and the process of creating it. Details of the offerings, and the tier payment system can be found by pressing the button above and also on Swallow’s About page.
If you are not able to contribute in this way, please consider sharing this project with friends or on socials to help spread its wings. Thank you for being here, and welcome to a new chapter of Swallow.
We talk so much of light, please let me speak on behalf of the good dark. Let us talk more of how dark the beginning of a day is.
An excerpt from
's How Dark the Beginning
Dear Readers (and listeners), Today’s entry features a special component that will only be available to paid subscribers after March 25th, 2023: audio narration. If you like it, consider upgrading to paid to hear my voice accompany written entries. Warmly from Tokyo, Jes
Entries most related to F from oldest to most recent: Birds and bread and honey, Of the overgrowth in places not meant for planting, Salt, sand, and burns, The green of color, Under construction 工事中, and 2022 was a fragmented love letter