cherub henry and Sam Harper moved to Berlin from New Zealand via London almost eight years ago. They now both study under Hito Steyerl at Berlin’s University of the Arts. cherub also works as a sex worker. In the summer of 2019, Sam and cherub founded a series of text-based performances called drift. drift is
TagPoetry
Knead & Other Selections
Knead… the earth with rain, and let it fain the glaring lips of the sun. Knead the earth. Pour your mortar among molded bricks and molten sand. Knead the earth, and erect your dwellings high. For like the shrub pierces the womb and sprouts from the face of Mother, you, too, shall wreak ruin. Reign
Encyclopedia of Stray Knowledge Gained During Quarantine
Locked up in my home for the last several weeks, I am missing the banal ecstasies of waking up next to the person I care about. Touch is impossible at the moment, as is casual conversation and the simple pleasure of being in a room together, quietly enjoying their company. Romance is replaced by the dull ache of missing someone: their bed, body, and self. Touch and companionship are gentle necessities, often forgotten or neglected until everyone in the world is feeling forgotten and neglected, and then we’re reminded how much we need each other.
I Imagine my House on Fire on New Year’s Eve
The house caught fire some time right before midnight, not officially celebratory, in or out of the city. The grass by the barn lit like matches, the light travelling down the brown strands now glowing gold, ending the fiery phrase with a black period.
A Day in Lecce, Italy
Lecce is a walled baroque city in the bootheel of Italy. I’ve decided to stay here alone for three weeks of break before returning to school. My travels and daily ambulation are for the high purpose of reading, writing, and drawing all that is around and within me, which, if I meditate enough, will be nothing. I write to stop writing.
Long Island
On the train by the dim / Lit water blue / With white boats / Sloping in, the train / Too metallic and / Rusted for the soft / Evening, the light inside / Too green, reminiscent / Of death and / Cleaning supplies
From the Archives – Celebrating the Eight(h)
The 8th March 2019 is the first year Berlin will celebrate International Women’s Day as an official public holiday. This day invites us to reflect on its historical and political implications. To mark the occasion and encourage contemplation, Die Bärliner has uncovered eight evocative pieces.
Separate
I don’t usually assign much spiritual significance to death, but on the 8th of December, when two friends and I went to Potsdam to explore an abandoned cemetery, taking a picture felt wrong. In an effort to make something from the experience or somehow preserve it, I sat down and wrote this poem.