Three pieces by Richard Hunsinger & Daisuke Shen

collaborative fiction & poetry

Mar 28, 2023

Three collaborative pieces by myself and one of my dearest friends, Richard Hunsinger. We created these pieces spontaneously — once at an Indian restaurant where we ate extremely salty curry, and twice at a friend’s house when they gave us old paintings to experiment with — right before Richard will go to serve his 32-month incarceration for his actions while protesting during the George Floyd Uprising of 2020.

It is a disservice to say that Richard changed and continues to change me as a person through the wealth of his kindness, humor, and brilliance. The expanse of his political and historical knowledge, combined with his passion for all of our shared freedom, has called me back into political action in our current times — something I had previously left in the past. I am beyond humbled and grateful for his existence in my life.

I am incredibly lucky as well as bitter to have become a friend of Rich’s in such a short period only to have to say goodbye for now, though our writing collaboration has only just begun. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber to Rich’s Substack (linked above), as he will need funds while inside.

To further support Richard, please visit his defense committee’s website at freerichardhunsinger.com, where they share the resources they have created with other people interested in doing legal support work. You can also follow them on Twitter @DefendRichard.

Until we are all free.

Sabbath Duties

One walks the creek’s edge knowing that if you do this right, the rocks do most of the work for you. The border of Earth is always a clearing where the water always violates every fixed line in time. They said the conifers dawned this spot but the kindling has supplied an infinite heat so long as the wall holds. The sheets I hang around the grounds shield me, to more aggressively identify my claim. To be obliterated in my enclosure would be an obstacle that even the laundry anticipates. I instructed her that this visibility would be no hindrance. A conspicuous presence in nature is no hindrance to me, as long as the light continues to hold.

When it rains the men all come running. What orifice, when pushed enough, does not yield water? That is all they want us to answer to. My body forms the question.

I loved him for his hair. To eat and eat it. At night, I slept with all the windows open. He shot forth like an evergreen. I didn’t expect for him to conquer me.

Every night I sit by the water, begging it to follow me. But I cannot lead what does not love me.

The sun cuts its teeth against the grass. I conduct bitter winds to splinter our town. Soon there’s gossip growing about me, my wicker basket. The man’s head, cleanly cut, rolling in my arms. It wasn’t that long ago I held it alive. One more trip down that creek on a Sunday, I told him, and that would really be it. He kissed me with his body. I remember his mouth forever, its curved scythe. It razed and razed me. Then my fingers slipped and murmured forth their song. At the end, it was summertime. That’s when the reaping begins and we are our most vulnerable, amidst our own plenty. Heat strikes and brings illness of which I know not but its lonesome fills me with a sense of terror. Especially to the sound. She used to bade me venture forth. And I would ask him if I had anything to fear, and he would tell me, not as long as I’m around, and she gave me that look and I knew she hated me.

It isn’t true I hated him. To hate implies room in one’s heart for emotion, and I’d gutted myself of it. Men hold beliefs about their importance in my life. As if he were the only one who splintered me. I allowed for him to steal my sight. I only allowed for him to think me captive.

And then there was the moment I went back to the water because she had taken too long. I didn’t know that the silt beneath my feet, bleeding into stream and disintegrating into the current would be my last sight. This graven image is still repeating in my present recollection. The water continues to cut into the ground of the bank, but nothing ever changes. I can’t even see what did, much less recall how it felt.

This time, the river obeys my calling. It laps up my body with its warm tongue. Reader, bear witness to our surging. We will swallow you inside of us.

If I enclosed it was a pretext of my unravelling, one that I now know was always happening. I can’t eat, but know I’m parched. I never guessed that Hell would be so dull.