archives & erasure

I think it’s also important to admit, to attest to, and to [bear] witness to the violence of the archive of slavery, which is about erasure. There are tick marks instead of names; it’s all about the slave’s relationship to the accumulation of wealth for another. The archive doesn’t tell us the story of someone’s life.

The person those entries were about hasn’t crossed my mind in months. But, at the moment, it was potent. It was real to me. Now? I couldn’t even tell you what the color of their eyes were. Isn't that just the most 20-something, melodramatic moment of intensity? Where it feels like both nothing and everything matters? I live, live, live for that.