Giannina Braschi - Yo-Yo Boing!

— For what?

— For something.

— Tess can write the script. But I’m sorry, it has to be in my book first because I already have Wassila, Mona, and Makiko’s childhood episodes — and I need Suzy’s.

— Suzy, Suzy, the dog in Short Cuts . I edited the soundtrack. Suzy and the policeman and the children.

— Suzy, I think and I talk of my mother, the way they talked of Suzy. My mother is coming. Stop. My mother has to cross the street. My mother is here. Isn’t she beautiful? She’s my mother. She’s Suzy.

— Be for real.

— And the bakery. Why did they turn to the baker for comfort when their boy died? And he offers them a muffin. And when they say they want to see his birthday cake, he had already thrown it out. Maybe he threw it out the moment he died. We’ll never know.

— It is depressing.

— No, it’s real. If you’re looking for a rainbow, you know there’s gonna be some rain. Be for real. The captain said:

— Now, throw your bottles!

It was the last time we would see land. We were in deep waters. Inside the bottle sealed with a cork, a letter to my mother and cigarettes for the fisherman so they could put a stamp on it.

— It got there?

— My mother received the letter and keeps it to this day with my Easter bonnet.

— The truth is that we are never properly dressed.

— Especially if you are dressed in New Jersey and you are returning to Croatia. There was mother and father, waiting after a year, Easter, for the ship to disembark, and my aunt in Hoboken dressed me like a blue bunny with a basket full of marshmallow eggs to give to my brother and sister. My mother, when she saw me, took me right to the ladies’ room and stripped me of my bunny dress. I thought I was fashionable with lilies on my bonnet and cherries on my shoes. All costumes are ridiculous. They all show how stupid we are believing in ludicrous mannerisms, which fade away, but be for real, baby, ’cause I don’t wanna be hurt. I was the lead singer in a rock band when I was 13, the Little Stone Faces, for real, then I started bingeing and got fat because I was small, and in my country in the age of Twiggy if you’re small, you dress dainty, and I was unhappy with their idea of me, as if I always had to wear frilly skirts because I was small, but here they say I’m Giuletta Massina. I started liberating myself when I came here, and I started dressing for my size, and wearing jeans, and unafraid to be myself, I liberated myself.

— Waiting for the miracle to come. Suzy, you’re carpe diem. I’m ubi-sunt. I never thought I would write an elegy about the past — my memories — lamentations — after I wrote the Inquisition of Memories. Never say I’ll never say never. You’ll say it. Again and again. Never again. The revenge of realities against dreams. And my mother tells me:

— Use some imagination. Don’t exploit your brother’s death and call me a piggy bank.

I can’t complain anymore. Stop, now let your wounds be healed with a kiss. Let me kiss it and make it feel better. Don’t touch it, let it dry, but you scratch it open, you want to see your wounds bleeding.

— Oh baby, be for real. Just let it flow.

— Oh, Suzy, let me wrap you in your capes, your scarves. Let’s see, maybe I can mix lemon and lime, oil and vinegar. Carpe diem, come here.

— Take me. I’m here.

— Oh, Suzy, I’m drunk. I don’t know what I’m feeling. And I don’t know where my carpe diem is. Did it fly away with Poetic License? Surprise. I have a Halloween in Christmas and Halloween in Easter. And ubi-sunt regrets: where is it? I’m here. Don’t listen. I’m drunk. But more drunk are my feelings that are filling me with drunken thoughts, and I mourn the elegy of my ubi-sunt while I dance with your carpe diem, collige virgo rosae .

— Everything is a sign. My voice teacher in London died of cancer before she turned forty. Her death began my destiny. My husband composed an opera for her, and I sang its premiere in Carnegie Hall. I was not very happy in London because I had no one to develop my voice. So I decided to cut my hair and start a new life here.

— I decided to let mine grow because Samson lost his strength when they cut his hair. It’s dangerous to have your hair cut every time you have a new idea.

— But what about my husband? He’s bald.

— Does he have a beard?

— A red one.

— Then he’s protected. Something must always grow in you. When my hair was very short I didn’t shave my legs or armpits. What was growing was a secret.

— Everything is a sign. People appear in your life as guardian angels who guide you through different realms of reality.

— You believe in destiny?

— I certainly do.

— You think we all have a purpose?

— I certainly do.

— Why, then, may I ask you, do most people live their lives without even knowing what they have to do? I don’t know why I am here, but since I am here, I want to do something.

— It’s all symbolic, yes, it’s predetermined and, yes, it’s sealed with a fatal kiss. For your blessing and well-being. That is what I believe.

— A friend of mine, a mezzo, who I want you to meet, has a beautiful voice, and she told me, there are so many people nowadays with beautiful voices. She said, it’s not enough, she said, you need to be an actress and look the part.

— It’s a matter of contacts.

— Everything helps, I say, but it all boils down to talent. Not talent alone, discipline and determination.

— I don’t believe in talent. It’s a bourgeoisie concept. It doesn’t exist. Abilities exist, capabilities. How many poor people have abilities they don’t even realize they have? Talent is the social conceit of a class like yours. Created by leisure. Not by necessity.

— You’ve got a real talent for denial. My father had the talent to write but not the capability to develop it. Talent is a grace. Capability is the history of circumstances.

— Here, Suzana, they are for you.

— Parrots, how lovely. Let me put them on.

— Aren’t they ravishing?

— Really, Mishy. You’re an artist.

— Don’t ever say that.

— Why not? You have talent. What you lack is confidence in yourself.

— It’s a matter of urge. The artist has an urgency. If you don’t act on it, you die. If you don’t create, nothing will create you.

— I don’t know. I don’t believe in life or death romantics. When I was studying at Cooper Union 25 years ago…

— Impossible!

— It’s true, I’m an old dog.

— Impossible!

— 25 years ago, I can’t believe it myself, I took a course with Andy Warhol, and he said that he makes art because he doesn’t know what else to do. I gotta admit, I identified.

— Maybe, it’s true, I didn’t know what else to do, no, it’s not true, I do what I do because I had something to say.

— I make jewelry when my husband is cutting bricks and when the kids are napping, but I don’t long to create something that makes an impact, that lasts.

— You never know, look at Paloma.

— The difference is the intensity, and the materials aren’t everlasting.

— Gold is everlasting, diamonds, pearls.

— I’m talking about everlasting passions.

— I thought we were talking about producing art. Some people say my paintings are emotional. Others say they are cerebral. I would say they are intellectual. I could have been an architect. Space is what images are about, ordering borders, creating space so that you can breathe. Where is the wind blowing? Where does the light come from — thinking — planning before you act.

— Sometimes thinking kills the spontaneity. You yourself have often told me that you have an idea for a painting but you can’t tell me what it is about because if you tell me, you will feel as though you already did the painting. Ideas die without the execution. Mishy is talking about the drive to execute.