Composers by Makenzie Gomez
In Jen Waldman's class C.R.E.A.T.E., where you're given creative ingredients, a prompt, and 60 minutes to create a piece of art, Makenzie Gomez raised her Zoom hand to share. Her creation painted a picture of the profound potential that exists when we begin to build a bridge between us. And we are so grateful we get to share it with y'all on Sappho Small Talk. Happy reading!
I have words in my head but instead of getting them on paper,
I sit staring into the abyss like the girl on the train.
But instead of wondering about an ex I find myself
Wondering what it would feel like to be a composer.
I find the art of composing so freaking magical.
But I could never be a composer.
Composers are proper people with sophisticated minds.
Composers write symphonies and all I do is find silly ways to rhyme.
No, I could never be a composer.
I’m the kind of person who does a happy dance when I take a bite of something yummy.
The composer in my mind would never.
I love the magic of composers, and keeping them othered keeps the magic alive.
I can admire this composer I’ve created in my mind unconditionally, and not understanding a single thing they do keeps the magic magical and keeps me me.
But what if the art of actively demolishing the othering our brains naturally turn to is even more magical than the magic kept alive from keeping separate in the first place?
What would happen if I met this composer in my mind, and offered them a piece of caramel chocolate? What if, not only did they take my gesture but danced like a dork just as I when we took a bite into the gooey goodness?
I find I’ve created unnecessary distance between myself and the composer. Because I don’t speak their exact language, I put them in a different stratosphere. But what I failed to mention or acknowledge at the top of this ramble, was the most obvious part of me… the most obvious ART of me: I dance. Not only do I dance, but I choreograph. I choreograph in my mind even when I don’t want to. A song comes on and I literally can’t help it. I see an entire performance playing before my mind's eye and I disappear into another universe.
In that universe, I am one with the composer. It’s because of what they do that triggers me to do what I do. If we both composed or both choreographed, the world would be boring and plain and we’d be all the same. Nobody wants that!
It makes me wonder: what other areas in my life am I creating unnecessary distance because I deem myself incapable of humanizing that which I admire? Who do I benefit from and refuse to acknowledge? Who am I scared to acknowledge, because once I recognize they are no longer a stranger, they have the power to hurt my heart in ways I don’t know if I can handle? But maybe that’s all part of the art of demolishing othering. When you cut the bullshit and see one another for all they truly are, the magic (and pain), beauty (and battle wounds), are exposed in this indescribable vulnerability. You’ll know it when you feel it. The walls are down for both parties, and no one is held captive. Anyone can leave or stay, and it’s up to them to decide.
What will they choose?
What will you?
The magic of opening your heart in such a way is as close as you’ll get to transcendence. And suddenly the magic I thought of with my imaginary composer seems so juvenile.
Makenzie Gomez (she/her/hers) is a Mexican-American queer woman of Tongva decent. She is a Brooklyn-based multidisciplinary storyteller. While she trained in, and still loves, musical theatre performing, Makenzie finds her voice most vulnerably expressed through the artistic mediums of choreographing, poetry, and blog style writing. Her work often meets at the same intersections of which she sits: queerness and faith, womanhood and power, inspiration and deconstruction, imagination and realism, and what it means to be a brown queer woman in America.