Raoni Muzho Saleh: Gathering in a Polyphonic MOOOOAAAAAAANN Safeguards Solidarity

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“What does it take to create a culture where it is allowed to fall into the bottomless abyss of heartache?”, asks Raoni Muzho Saleh. This poetic contemplation is the literary equivalent of Raoni’s ceremonial gatherings, which he calls “Mourning Socialities”. Throughout this episode, Raoni contemplates on the power and significance of the moan as an expression of mourning and how this sound connects with the profound states of loss and suffering. Interrogating himself, the listener and the societies of which they are a part, Raoni explores these questions in monologue and through moaning. By braiding the moan into the fabric of his speech, Raoni invites listeners to come together in a polyphonic groan to experience the commonality of grief. This bemoaning contemplation calls for a renewed relationship with the body and embodiment, where grief and loss are not only approached mentally and rationally but also experienced and expressed physically.

A transcript of the text is available here.

Raoni Muzho Saleh is a choreographer and performer based in Amsterdam. Born in Afghanistan and raised in Pakistan, his thinking and work is shaped by fugitivity as a radical movement. By dancing through the gender spectrum, Raoni has developed a unique movement practice that emphasizes “becoming other”, a continuous state of incompleteness. Through the use of materials such as textile, dough, voice, and text, Raoni invites a serious kind of play into space where all can become immersed in otherworldly stories.

This broadcast is the second of a three-part series on embodied listening and non-verbal vocal expression, curated by Radna Rumping. Other episodes: 'Laraaji - Guided Laughter Release' (out now) and ‘Laraaji, Raoni Muzho Saleh & Radna Rumping in conversation’ (3 October). All episodes will stay available through our archive.

For more information vGathering in a Polyphonic MOOOOAAAAAAANN Safeguards Solidarity Listen. Listen again. ahhhhhhhh... Take a moment to bring awareness to your breath. sighhhhhh What is present in your breathing at this moment? Listen again. ohhhhhh... Is there someone close to you? Listen to the space between you. Can you imagine what lies hidden within your comrade? hmmmm... Listen. As a choreographer and a dancer, I have been taken and persuaded by the moan in recent years. The moan as a choreographer, the moan as an ancestor, as a mentor, and the moan as an old friend. siiiiiiggghhhh This research has taken the form of both performances and collective lamenting events that I call "Mourning Sociality." For today I will share with you a bemoaning speech that questions how we can create a culture that guarantees the commonality of loss and grieving processes. I invite you to let this bemoaning speech sink into you with a gentle sigh. hhmmmmm What is our current cultural relationship with mourning, and how sustainable is this cultural behaviour? ohhhhhhh... Why is it normal to keep death hidden and confined to cemeteries and obituaries? For whom and for what is it beneficial to deal with mourning in this way? ahh ahh ahh aiiiiii The Western culture dominated by an imposed rationality, being the opposite of emotionality, prevents us from being present with death, with that age-old feeling of loss and mourning. aahhhhh-ahhhhhhhhhh We live in a culture where emotional disconnectedness and apathy have become normalised. Not too long ago, in this continent, the family of the deceased would hang white sheets from the windows to indicate that they had lost a loved one. The white sheets stood in solidarity with the family's mourning. In this way the grieving family signalled their pain to the outside world. The white sheets, which veiled the eyes of the house for a while, allowed for an osmosis of heartache. oooooooooeeeeeeeuuuhhhhhuhuuu These fluttering sheets acted as a porous barrier, freely moving the sorrow of the people from inside to outside, from private to public, and from silence to emotional expression. Therefore, the family’s suffering was not banished to the private domain; instead, through the signalling white sheets, the family’s loss also became part of the community's sentiment. aahhhh-ahh-aaaaarrrrrrrgggggghhhhhh The sheets cried out to the community: "Can you see and hear the suffering of these people? How does their throbbing pain resonate with the ache lying within your own heart? Come, come and carry your own despair and weave it into the tragedy of these people!" AAAAAAARRRRGGGHHHHHHHHH Why are these rituals no longer common in our modern lives? What is stopping us from surrendering ourselves in our grief, in our most vulnerable state, to the people we belong to and desiring the same from others? ssiiiigghhhhhh How come collective 1 mourning ceremonies have fallen into oblivion? uuhhhhhmmmmm Again, I wonder: for whom, or for what, is it beneficial to confine mourning to the private domain, behind closed doors? ooehuhhhuuuhooehhhh This disease called modernisation, driven by capitalist greed, is based on a specialised and highly developed form of bureaucracy. The promises of these structures include safety and an easy access to everything our hearts desire. Are these structures and the promises they make distractions from the creaking and groaning of our own corporeality and that of others? oooooooo-aaawwhuhuhhhaaahuuuuwwuuuuuuu Because, why rely on the support of the community when the grieving process can be efficiently and independently handled, for example, through a funeral insurance? Why should we be present with the “destabilising” state of mourning when we can quickly bury the dead and get back to our daily lives? There's no point in losing ourselves in the chaos and turbulence of mourning, immersing ourselves in its disastrous poetic experience, when order and clarity are at hand, right? hhuuwaa-huhhuwaa-huhhuwaahuhuwaauuhuhuwa-huhuhuu-huhuhh A world where grieving processes are orderly and clear promises resilience against grief. In a worldview ruled by rationality it is terrifying to be vulnerable and to loose yourself. But how much heartache do we have to sacrifice to become disassociated from our own vulnerability? aaahhhhhhhh siiiiiiiggghhhhh And once again, whom or what does this disassociation of affect service? Why do we steadfastly hold onto a culture that locks death away in hidden spaces, away from where it can be acknowledged by life? aaauuuwwwaaarrrrghhhhhh-aaauuuuuwwwwww The idea that death and 1 the deceased speak to us through the objects they loved, through a flame that suddenly ignites, through the sparkle in a gaze, through a fracture in a mirror. This idea rattles the order and clarity that capitalist modern life demands. The idea that death is intertwined with our everyday actions and experiences brings death closer, demanding that we face our own and another’s woundedness, embrace it, just as the fluttering white curtains used to embrace the house's windows. Martin Prechtel, a shaman whose teachings I follow loyally, speaks and writes passionately about the relationship between mourning and praising. The Tz'utujil people in Guatamala, whom he served as a shaman for over twenty-five years, practice the idea that mourning and praising are two limbs of the same body, thus inseparably connected. They mean that when you mourn someone, you are actually praising that person's life. And when you praise someone full heartedly, while praising, you are struck by the impermanence of life and, therefore, simultaneously mourning life. Martin says that mourning is, in fact, a form of gratitude for being alive and experiencing grief. 2 OUUUUUUU-OOOOOAAAUWWWAAAAAAAWWWWW Martin advocates 1 Reference to the poem “In Order to Talk With the Dead” by Jorge Teilliers 2 Youtube link to Martin Prechtel’s talk “Grief & Praise”: https://www.youtube.com/watch? v=UUwewfPPSbE 2 letting go of the idea that grief is an unpleasant state that needs to be resolved. Instead, he encourages us to let the heart's wailing be heard in togetherness, in an ensemble of misfits in love with life. What if there is indeed no solution to the age-old heartache called grief? What if the only solution is to feel the sorrow and be held by others in that state of being? ooooooeeehwwwaaauuuhhyyyyhhyyyyaa... What does it take to create a culture where it is allowed to fall into the bottomless abyss of heartache? What cosmological ideas and forms of relationships do we need to develop that allow us to surrender to that falling? In his poem "Details," Ghayath Almadhoun writes: "It was the most beautiful war of my life, full of metaphors and poetic images. I remember how I sweated adrenaline and pissed black smoke, how I ate my own flesh and drank cries. Death leaned his skinny body on the ruins that his poem had caused and wiped his knife clean on my salt." siiiighhhh... The Syrian-born Palestinian poet Almadhoun calls upon us to feel the taste of death and loss to safeguard our physicality. aaah-aarrrrrggghhhhhhhh Which persons around us, and I include other creatures and objects in the category of persons, carry the aftertaste of our grief within them? And how can we embrace that aftertaste without rationalising it? How can we love these persons so that they may add flavour to our lives? Let us bid farewell to a Cartesian worldview, where reason and rationality define our humanness. Instead, let us honour that it is through our corporeality, our fleshiness, our cries that our stories are interwoven with one another. aahhhhhh-aiiiiaaaaarrrrggghhhh-aahhhhuuuuhuuhuuuu… What kind of relationship with the body and embodiment is required to be present with death, to taste the aftertaste of loss? ggrooooaaannn... With what language do we prepare ourselves for the bodily experience of loss? How can we transform our Cartesian thinking and being into a language and a doing that ensures the palpability of loss? In this exploration of the language of grief, I let myself be guided by the moan. The moan which choreographs a dance of whining voices and which serves as my companion and mentor. The moan as an ancestor, connecting my body and voice with all other beings who also give song to the shivering in their hearts and share it with their loved ones. The moan is accompanied by sorrow, lamentation, sighs, and release, but it is also be prompted towards privatisation and/or silence. Away from where a larger group of bodies, bones, veins, hearts, flesh, and skins can be moved to feeling and to acting. aiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiaiiaii-aaaaaiiiihhhhh Because the moan is ugly and makes you uncomfortable. The moan is beautiful and brings you to tears. The moan is heavy and tugs at your heart with a pain that is not personal but relatable. The moan can be as simple as a baby softly sighing. hhhmmmm... The moan is dreadful and hysterical. The moan whines. The moan is angry. And the moan is incredibly bold. The moan provides emotional and spiritual release. The moan, as a lament, is akin to a nomadic traveler coming from afar, carried by the howling wind and 3 broken swaying hearts. In its mutability, the moan is a force not to be underestimated. Because it is in the nature of the moan to connect through expression, the moan refuses to be suppressed. Through its expression, the moan can move one to disobedience and resistance to abuse of power. And through its dynamic essence, the moan connects the grieving singer with the listener(s), weaving a web of affective sympathy wherever it goes. auuuwwhhhuuuhuuuuuuuhuuuuuuuuuuuuhuhu... The moan is utilised all over the world by professional mourners to bewail that sweet, old, inevitable pain that life brings. oeeehhhh Therefore, the moan also encompasses the feeling of being connected to the gifts of life. Ultimately, the moan transcends the human. The moan is the sonic fabric that connects us with the rest of the animals. The moan offers us, as humans, access to the non-human world, enriching our experience of life. Our mentors in moaning are indeed the whales, the wolves, the owls, the howling wind— in other words, the living world we’re submerged. oooooeehhhhhh-aaaaarrrhhhhhhhhhhhh-ahhhh-ahhh-ahh So what must be stirred within us, within each individual, to be able to listen to the sighing, whimpering, and breathing brethren that we already are? What do we need to rid ourselves from, as individuals and communities, in order to recognise the whining, moaning and lamenting in our own breathing and in that of another? siiiiiiiiggghhhhhhhh Through the moan, one expresses heartache and heart's joy. By wailing in togetherness, one weaves a sonic fabric of collective heartache and heart's joy. A community that breathes and lives in solidarity with one another is polyrhythmic and can be both harmonious and dissonant. What caring sensuality lies behind a multitude coming together to moan? Mmm... the word sensuality. ahhhhhh-yeaahh-ahhhh-ahhhhhhh What is sensual about offering support when someone is in grief? What is desirable about solidarity? When we gather in mourning, in that endless polyphonic groan, our collective sound cuts through the idea that commonality is impossible. UUUUAAAWWWHHHHAAAAAAARRRRRGHHHHHH Through our polyphonic lamentation, we test the possibilities of solidarity and integrity. When we allow our suffering to resonate through the continuous practice of moaning, we demand to be heard in our experience, in our pain, in our doubt, in our joy, in our shuddering, in our ecstasy, in our existence. AAAAAAARRRRGHHHH-AHHH-AWWWWWAHHH-AHHH What opens up, what reveals itself when we pay attention to that endless lamenting within ourselves and in others? From which wounds, from which sensed realities does that sighing sound emanate? From which sensuality does our body scream? hmmmmm….. What possibilities for the future do we study in our own whimpering and that of others? And what histories do we restore by gathering in collective mourning processes? aauuwww-aaaaauuuuuwwhhhh-uhuhu-uaaawwwwuuhhuhuhuuu 4 When we shift our precious grief from the public to the private, from expression to hiding, we deprive ourselves of the opportunity to be carried by a sense of intimacy. When we no longer recognise the beauty in the lament of the other, we deprive ourselves of the chance to live in connectedness. Therefore, coming together to moan, to sigh, to scream, and to lament in song is a political act. oooooeeeehoooooohoooooooeeeeehhooooeeee Within each repetition and performance of both the personal and collective heartache, we practice a different world. By expressing the multi-rhythmic wail, we rehearse what is necessary to intimately embrace an utopian longing for solidarity. uuuaaaarrraaaahhhhhhhh-uuuuhhhhaaaahhh-uhuhuuu By being present, by expressing the polyphonic sonic fabric that intertwines us with and within each other we repeat, rehearse, reverb the realisation of integrity. hhhhhuu-huuuuu-hhhm-hmmm 5isit our website: www.jajajaneeneenee.com