none of them can move like us

I climbed a tree for the first time in, oh, decades this summer, putting up this work for the Tombola parksalong in Gothenburg with Anne Marte Overaa. Anne Marte invited me to collaborate and it was so great to watch people stand in and around, and go through one of my lines! It was also a pleasure as to wander round the park, meeting nice people and seeing their work.

Anne Marte crafted this beautiful moving portal. The line came from a poem with the same title published in The City of Poets annual review 2024. It’s like a dance-off in a line – at least that was my feeling as soon as it hit the page. I will find the poem and post it here too one day, but not now, because on its own in the park, the line also moved contextually. Of the work, the following can be said:

To move is both to feel motion and to be aware of the stationary. The stationary gives us a sense of position and balance, as well as a sense of freedom. Everything is rarely in motion at once, but while we are in motion, we have the gift – whoever or whatever we are. The “them” and “us” is the great turn-taking of life. Everything and everyone has their turn. Now it is their turn. Now it is your turn. Now it is our turn.