I Lost Our Conversation
computer keyboard keys, plastic, cotton thread
Keyboards hold secrets. They keep logs of our ideas, questions, fears, and hopes. My computer keyboard continually serves as confidant, always willing to listen and take note.
I find typing to be a way to bridge the distance that exists when someone else isn’t there--physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually--a way to understand the impact of that distance, to explore the unspoken and determine what should remain unsaid.
After digging through almost a decade’s worth of my unpublished blog entries and email drafts, I pulled out sentences and fragments that resonated. I cut, pasted, and arranged those fragments into a found poem, which shares the same name as the installation, I Lost Our Conversation. The installation is constructed from discarded computer keyboard keys, each word locked inside its own plastic packaging--the digital remnants safely preserved in tangible form.
Image Descriptions:
Image 1: Detail view of one packet of keyboard keys. The keyboard letter “h” and symbol “/” spell “Hi”. The keys are encased in plastic packaging with brown stitching.
Image 2: A detail view of multiple packets spelling out “I hate this. Does everyone”. Each letter is a keyboard key - all are alphabet letters with the exception of the O in “Does”, which is the number zero. Each word is contained in its own individual plastic packet with brown stitching.
Image 3: A detail view of the installation viewed at an angle - keyboard key colors are visible, but not specific letters. Keys are black, white, gray and tan.
Image 4: Full view of the installation. Keyboard key packets spell out words and sentences, installed on the gallery wall in multiple columns - each column with its own rows of text.
I Lost Our Conversation - Text
Hi again.
I hate this.
Does everyone feel this way?
I’m sleeping in my bed again most nights.
I’m crying more at sad movies.
I’m not feeling anything in real life.
There are so many dead bugs here.
Last night I dreamt of spiders.
I lost our conversation.
Please don’t leave me like this.
I will never stop loving you.
I just don’t know how to say it.
I wish I could at least be close.
I wish I could give you a hug.
Why are you always pulling shit like this?
Please, come on.
I cried for four and a half minutes.
Nothing seems important.