Hold the body  the baby          the urge

            to hold that stutters muscle

            that cradles warm air

crush yours into mine to tell me what I’ll miss

from the way you move through a room

 

give me proximity like a threat then

give it again so I’ll remember it real good

 

I like best to find me suggestive

like best the self           to let you move into what’s left

            let it stutter 

like it best when you can’t tell me anything

your wanting me to want

it’s best when I want into dark

                        what I don’t have to say aloud

 

there’s nothing to say but         breath

to bring to the room a mercy of limbs

I came to give your hands a burden

I came to your hands the cradle of wrist

 

it’ll look good for me to look good doing that

                        like it best like that like I let you do like I mean it

it’s best if we only remember through the body

to build muscle around it before you go

 

the urge to reach you stutters my body

and I speak from the choke of my throat

don’t let us let the air know that this is our most vulnerable

the crush of things the proximity that might kill

            don’t let the room empty before

I’ve built the muscle to remember

don’t go until I can like it like that

During a time of social distancing, art is a powerful way for us to unite.

Translating meaning across two different art forms, in 2020 Red Room Poetry and the National Gallery of Australia (NGA) brought together poet Evelyn Araluen and photographic artist Pixy Liao. Evelyn was commissioned to respond poetically to Pixy’s intimate 2010 work, 'Some words are just between us'. The pieces were published side-by-side in the NGA's Artonview Winter magazine 2020. Pixy's work was exhibited in the NGA's 2020 exhibition, 'The Body Electric' – a showcase of women artists on the subjects of sex, pleasure and desire.