An excerpt from “Go, or, The Approximate
Infinite Universe of Mrs. Robert Lomax”
As a performance artist, Justin Chin has
created eight full-length solo performance works and
several shorter
works, which have been presented nationally and abroad.
Attack of the Man-Eating Lotus Blossoms is a
collection of these performance art texts, along with
documents,
and scripts, that represent Chin's work from 1993-2001.
THE BOY: There are some places where dogs are afraid
to bark. If a dog barks at night and no dog barks back
in conversation, then the dog has seen a ghost, a spirit.
I am in dire need of tenderness, Robert declares one
day. He looks at me as if I am supposed to do something
about his dire need. All my life, I am in dire need of
tenderness and I have found it with you, he declares.
He smiles and places his head in my lap.
Woof.
Mr. Robert Lomax is sleeping. He is sleeping in my bed.
It is early morning. I am sitting on the veranda looking
out into the city. Mr. Robert Lomax has given his heart
to me. I don’t know what to do with it. He entreats
me to be tender with it, thought I have no idea what
I have to do to achieve that. There has to be more choices
than love and tender. This I do know for sure: some men
will be loved all their lives and some men will never
be loved all their lives. You know very early on which
one you will be. Neither one nor the other is good nor
bad, they just are. I discovered very early on which
one I was to be, and I am enduring it.
Woof.
There are tourists and there are travelers. Both will
go the distance, both want to see as much as possible,
both are looking for adventure, both are looking for
something new, both are looking for the real thing, both
are willing to pay for the real thing; but one will eventually
long for some semblance of home, one is already home.
And Robert? And Robert keeps asking for transfers for
one more ride.
Woof.
SLIDE:
Justin Chin, as worn by Identity, Bugbear. $9.99.
Accessories: Model’s own.
(The sound of movie projector reels clacking. The closing
lines of the movie The World of Suzie Wong is heard.
But this time, these lines repeat in irregular loops.
The clacking segues into an ethereal soundscape of shrieks,
screams, yelps and wailing; however, these are in no
way frightful or threatening sounds, in fact, they are
strangely musical and symphonious. The closing lines
are still looping.
Robert: Suzie, please, will you marry me?
Suzie: Robert, I stay with you until you say “Suzie,
you go.”
Small bits of sentimental love songs—Linda Ronstadt’s
version of “I Will Always Love You”, Tom
Jones’ “It’s Not Unusual”, power
ballads from the ’80s—pop out through all
of this, as if someone was turning the dial on a radio
and passing various stations.)
[Click here for Audio Sample]
SUZIE WONG: There are some people who will be loved
throughout their lives and there are some people who
will be unloved
throughout their lives. You discover very early on in
life which one you’ll be. Then you can either fight
it like a champion boxer until you’re damaged or
you can take it face on. Penelope Pitstop, unsaved by
The Anthill Mob, run over by the train, sawed in half
by the timber saw. There’s nothing wrong with either,
actually. It’s just the way some folks choose to
live. Nothing to do with blessings or curses, so don’t
bother your saints, your gods, and your deities; don’t
bother with incantations, charms, and magic. Don’t
bother at all.
Something very strange happened two weeks after they
dropped the bomb on Nagasaki. One day, quite suddenly,
irises started to sprout and bloom out of the ripped
soil. Normally, the bulbs would have remained dormant
until the appropriate season, but perhaps due to the
heat, the radiation and the trauma to the earth, the
bulbs pushed out of the earth and within days bloomed
into their usual lush blue and yellows. They didn’t
know better. They probably thought that it was time,
and they stuck their little buds out into the air only
to find people dead, dying, burnt, ill, crippled, homeless,
and too shell-shocked to care about flowers blooming
out of season in poisoned ground.
Robert: Suzie, please, will you marry me?
Suzie: Robert, I stay with you until you say “Suzie,
you go.”
Where are we in THE STORY. The true/false STORY of my
life with Mr. Robert Lomax. There are holes obviously.
Big holes you could trip and fall into like some Jerry
Lewis slapstick comedy. Big holes like an electron pushed
to an outer orbital, creating a space for something to
fall in. Waiting for something to fall in and fill it.
Robert is gone. The war around me has changed, a silly
game of musical chairs. When the music stops, and the
extra chair is whisked away, and another whisked away
until the last one is left standing as the world stares
at THE UNFORTUNATE ONE who wasn’t fast enough to
wriggle the buttocks onto the last remaining seat.
Robert: Suzie, please, will you marry me?
Suzie: Robert, I stay with you until you say “Suzie,
you go.”
Robert is gone and he never sacrificed anything for
me as he promised. All I’m looking for is one good
sacrifice. And I got it, too.
Some lies are the subversion of experience, the prized
monster in a freak show.
Robert: Suzie, please, will you marry me?
Suzie: Robert, I stay with you until you say “Suzie,
you go.”
The big gaping hole that you fell in is the exquisite
sacrifice. Believe everything I tell you even as I tell
you that there are no such things as a True Story.
“How many holes does it take to fill the Royal
Albert Hall?”
Robert: Suzie, please, will you marry me?
Suzie: Robert, I stay with you until you say “Suzie,
you go.”
I invent. I invent. I invent and we’re back in
THE STORY searching for the sacrifice as the music starts
again. Ten chairs laid out waiting for THE NEXT UNFORTUNATE
ONE.
I am as old as my mother’s blood and I am still
full of holes.
(The loop of movie dialogue has progressively gotten
quieter and quieter but in such small decrements that
one hardly notices it fading out. It can still be heard,
but seems like an echo. The screams and shrieks seem
to have gotten quieter too, but they only seem that way
because they are being played backwards. The bits of
pop songs now linger in slightly longer snatches.
This polyphony continues even after the lights have
very slowly faded to black, and then it too fades away.)
© 2005 Justin Chin - Contributor's
Bio
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