Dark Cave

“His heart was a dark cave filled with sharp toothed, fierce clawed beasts that ran snapping and tearing through his blood. In pain he left the work table and prowled around the room, singing to himself, ‘Who can I be tonight? Who will I be tonight?’”

—Alfred Chester, Exquisite Corpse (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1967)

An intimate tone poem in two parts, the first passage of Dark Cave consists of black-and-white footage of the flora and fauna of my backyard garden with a montage of nature sounds. Alfred Chester’s quote bridges the opening section and yields to a second, contrasting movement. Sun-drenched color Super-8 images of the historic fortress, cemetery, and beaches of Old San Juan combine with Victoria William’s laconic song “Happy” to evoke the ambivalence of memory.

This title is also available on Third Known Nest by Tom Kalin.