Walterhoope Artists
To the Shouter - Too Like the Lightning (Part 1 of 5)
Too Like the Lightning
Written, Directed, and Produced for Film by Walterhoope
Original Poetry by Teresa Spencer
Sound & Original Music by Matthew M. Nielson, The Curious Music Co.
Cinematography & Editing by David Mavricos
Starring
Audrey Bertaux
Billy Chace
Ernaisja Curry
Tatiana Godfrey
Padma
William Vaughan
A Note from the Poet, Teresa Spencer:
A year ago, I was driving along on Route 50, in the little private bubble of my car, just minding my own business, probably listening to Feist or something. And then all of a sudden there’s this air horn in my blind spot and I’m like shit shit shit am I about to crash and die? Oh. No. It’s just this trucker who wants to fuck me. And I started to wonder, like, what did that guy want from that exchange? Like what did he really want? Like what if that was his misguided, sort of hamfisted effort to connect with me? What if he was just trying to be like, “I think you’re probably a really nice person. Can I take you to coffee? Can we talk about the books you’re reading?” I think if he thought about my reaction at all, he probably thought he was paying me a compliment. But if street harassment is a compliment…let’s follow that through to its logical conclusion.
What if that was the beginning of our love story?
So, I wrote him a love poem.
And then I wrote some more.
Juliet says to her Romeo:
I have no joy of this contract tonight:It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;Too like the lightning, which doth cease to beEre one can say 'It lightens.'
I feel like that’s exactly how things are between dudes on the street and women who are just trying to get from place to place, goddammit. They’re these tragic little ephemeral trysts…too brief, too fleeting, too like the lightning. So, I called this collection Too Like the Lighting: Prose Poems to My Almost Loves.
As I continued to write these poems based on other women’s stories, I found that these lightning moments happen in all kinds of different contexts. So the definition of how women get put in their place in public spaces was starting to expand and expand and expand: catcalling, yes, but also mansplaining, online harassment, and sometimes more sinister events, where the threat of sexual violence is overt, not just implied.
These poems tell stories sent to me by all kinds of women, young and not, privileged and not, they are mothers, they are queer, they are fabulous dressers or they wear parkas. And all the stories are true.
