Toni Ann Johnson and Alisha Dietzman now in Air/Light
This week in Air/Light:
Fiction: “Gramercy Park is Closed to the Public” by Toni Ann Johnson
Poetry: “Miroslav Tichý,” “Miroslav Tichý, Untitled,” “The Subject Covers Her Face” by Alisha Dietzman
And stay tuned for next week, where we’ll feature work by Roaa Aladdin Missmeh and Sarah Jacobus from Gaza Diaries, a publication of We Are Not Numbers (WANN), a Gaza-based project that seeks to amplify the voices of young Palestinian writers.
“Gramercy Park is Closed to the Public” by Toni Ann Johnson
Dex was on his way to Cornell in the fall and Luna had another year of high school. The looming separation impelled them to cling together that summer.
His appreciation for Black culture was sincere and infectious and he insisted she avail herself of activities the city had to offer—museum and gallery visits, comedy shows, and jazz and blues concerts—all things his intellectually curious father had exposed him to. Dex also recommended books by Baldwin, Morrison, and Ellison, plays by Leroi Jones and Lorraine Hansberry, and essays by W.E.B. Du Bois and George S. Schuyler. Luna found it embarrassing that her white boyfriend felt obliged to educate her on Blackness. But she enjoyed the attention. She didn’t tell him she already knew about most of the stuff he shared, because if she did, he might spend less time with her. Sometimes, in addition to recommending things, he actually provided them. When he gave her books, Luna didn’t mention that they were readily available in her own house.
“Miroslav Tichý,” “Miroslav Tichý, Untitled,” “The Subject Covers Her Face” by Alisha Dietzman
MIROSLAV TICHÝ
Sunbathes on a roof. He goes on trial.
In 1972, his studio is destroyed.
He makes a lens. He calls the erotic
a dream anyway. He paints; he stops painting.
He photographs women, always:
women in dresses, women undressed.
Thin strap(s). Women, languid
under trees. Touching an ankle.
He becomes an enemy of the state.
Under light state-surveillance
he surveils women in various states,
in various lights. He reads
Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, claims:
when I take a photograph I don’t think about anything.