Blog – Art in Odd Places

AiOP 2016: RACE Thinker in Residence: Sahaj Kohli

December 29, 2016 – 12:00 pm

2016 Art in Odd Places Race Banner

Though this year’s festival may be over, there are still those who have its works and impacts on their minds. Our Thinkers in Residence each went out during the festival days and engaged with the artists, the works, the public, and the street. They had their own reactions and interpretations of what they saw and experienced. As we look forward to 2017, let us take the time to look back on what these Thinkers thought and read their perspectives on this year’s festival.

Thinker in Residence: Sahaj Kohli

Bio:

Sahaj Kohli is a storyteller and a poet who uses (solo) travel, identity and human connection as her inspiration. She’s an editor at The Huffington Post and loves advocating for mental health/personal development, wandering aimlessly and building community. She also takes pride in being an aunt and helping to raise four good men. She lives in New York City but often is homesick for places she’s never been.

what does it mean to be

an other

to have

two halves

striking no resemblance

a marionette can’t surrender

the seams at her shoulders, torn,

draped by long black

hair like the edge of the earth

claimed by rogue waves at midnight

skin, darker than your late December

snow-filled mornings

a hoop ring-decorated nose

feminine, subtle, subservient

rebellious

assimilating with the wrong crowd

you recognize parts of me

as yours, claim my disassociation

but I don’t belong

straddling two places

without answers, plagued

I’m like you.

I’m like them.

I drift

AiOP 2016 RACE Thinker in Residence: Sara Rempe

December 28, 2016 – 12:00 pm

2016 Art in Odd Places Race Banner

Thinker in Residence: Sara Rempe

Bio: Sara Rempe received her MFA from Hunter College and currently teaches creative writing in the college’s English Department. Her feature film, The Last Day of August, can be found on iTunes.

Marathon

I taught myself to run,
& was stunned: the body undrunk:

the heart’s arduous pump,
the arms’ initial awkwardness—how

to be held? Legs going numb, hips
pinched, lungs stung , bones

grinding in their sockets, knees crackling,
feet suddenly dumb.

I told myself to run
at dusk down the yellow

line, through the middle
of streets so nothing

could touch me.
I took the oath to beat my body

into submission, not to stop
until I crossed the line: each day

ran the same course: started north
and made a great circle back, trapped

in my agony—frenzied—trying
to get free without

doing harm. I made myself run.
I learned to let the pain in

for miles before the high and for a time
it was worth the ache—like loyalty

before a split—demanding I love it
while begging to quit.