The Call to Space

Part I: Occupancy: Embodiment

We are all looking for ways “To be here. To be now. To be home,” within ourselves. This is why I’m concerned, possibly obsessed, with splitting the hairs of being an occupant in space and being embodied in space. The former suggests that you’re here, but not quite – perhaps like in Julie Choffel’s, “The Problem With Immediacy,” you’re aware, (like a mother, perhaps a mother) and your body makes a door, “and the body knowing it has, ever after, has a door,” but you question the immediacy you have even to yourself after being made a way.

Embodiment suggests that you’re not just self-possessed, but also that in you is company for others to occupy – sometimes so you can pretend to be who others want you to be; sometimes our bodies are involuntarily made homes, and we pretend we’re here, as our skin, Serena Chopra says, “[shakes] like autumn losing itself to the bones.” But occupancy and embodiment is not merely about presence. By knowing who you are, you can boldly make space for others (alike and otherwise) who also question the audacity of the margin’s determination to confine and define, make you “or”, make you split.

–Bre’Anna Bivens, Special Issue Editor