What We All Long For

From What We All Long For, by Dionne Brand:

Anonymity is the big lie of a city. You aren't anonymous at all. You're common, really, common like so many pebbles, so many specks of dirt, so many atoms of materiality.

~~~~~~~~~~

It was Wilde About Sappho, Canada's national queer literary festival, visiting Guelph. Sky Gilbert's poetry, especially "The Island of Lost Tears," had me on the verge. The other four writers were unfamiliar. Warren Dunford was funny, Anna Camilleri sumptuous and nostalgic, R.M. Vaughan refreshingly profane.

But Dionne Brand stirred my guts with her evocation of humanity on Toronto streets: so familiar, and yet stunningly insightful. She and Gilbert are faculty members of English and Theatre Studies here at University of Guelph.

I didn't expect a chance to speak with her at the gala afterwards. At the end, just as everyone was leaving, a space cleared between us and she turned toward me.

I gushed about the opening subway scene she had read from What We All Long For: judgments of strangers, how they reflected my own inner thoughts. I described the novel I am writing about the ex-gay movement, how writing it has peeled away judgments. She seemed genuinely interested, responded helpfully.

Her companion was anxious to leave, so we said goodbye. As she moved away, I said, "I hope they hold this in Guelph again next year."

Smiling over her shoulder, she said significantly, "I am here."

( refrigerator, high-speed internet, Colleen )