"archemedes and me,
both married in our own way
to old ideas in new clothes."
-j. cale

on an overpass above amsterdam avenue at 117th street in new york city there stands a statue that is shaped curiously like a tooth amidst a sea of strange and vaguely inappropriate-for-the-occasion sculptures outside of columbia's law school.



this statue rotates if you get enough people together to push it, a simple machine to make archemedes proud. it's quite fun. over the years, however, it has worn itself down, and now requires a great effort to even move it a slight distance.

I composed an, uh, "elegiac poem" to said tooth-esque structure, entitled "O, Tooth!" and performed it at the scene. considering I am not a poet, it went as well as could be expected.

O, tooth!
A basalt gleam in paling light,
Marching with march hares
Your power all our own.

We are your force, tooth,
As agency embodied, torque and torsion,
You move and we move with you,
We walk past, you stand alone.

Should we come to sleepless night,
Deserted paths and fitful dreams,
I will press my shoulder to your side,
And drive us on till dawn.

performance and further photographs follow.