Tina #7188, from Series Tina 2016
There is a kind of intimacy between two people who don’t understand the concept of boundaries.
Some of us can choose when to be seen.
Freedom might be slipping on a cheap wig, a dress, some lipstick, and going to Tesco.
We must take responsibility for the effect of attention on others, even in a glance.
I find it hard not to be distracted by a shiny object in all this mundanity.
Like a magpie, I want Tina for myself.
I tacitly demand subjugation
and Tina gives it willingly – she feels my needs.
Aphrodite comes to mind —
love, beauty, longing — born from rupture, from what was discarded, as Tina thrashes on wasteland just outside Basildon.
I want to understand, but I only ever see her,
never what life could have been.
Dear Tina, this is partly an apology.
I respond to your invitation in the only way I know how:
“You’re beautiful – show me more.”
