Beatriz Badikian:Unveiling the Mind

for Nawal el-Sadawi

Although your brother
failed in school, he was rewarded
by playing outside. You,
who succeeded,
were rewarded by working in the kitchen.
The schoolbooks said:
the stars were created by God. But...
who created God? you asked.

An explosion of white hair,
every life is important, you say.
Write your life.

In prison, paper and pen
are more dangerous
than guns. You wrote your memoirs
on smuggled out toilet paper with
an eyebrow pencil
from a prostitute; you hid them
in a tin can under the floor. The guard
never found them. Writing more
necessary than breathing, you ask:

Why do we write?
And answer: Not to die, to be immortal.
And demand the unveiling of the mind.

- Beatriz Badikian

Beatriz Badikian: Mapmaker

I am Eratosthenes' heir -- the librarian
who measured earth. He took an obelisk,
a well, the sun, and made a triangle:
geometry, simple and accurate.

A cartographer of sorts -- I measure
earth with words. I have drawn roads
and made them impassable. I have laid
railroad tracks to serve as escape
routes. I have surveyed rivers and
seas by touch and taste. And yet,
I ignore my point of departure or
destination: only know the lands
that lie in between.

Growing up under an obelisk's shadow I
heard the story of genocide, of World
War II, read geography, poems,
swallowed them whole and learned -- but

this journey never ceases.
Mapmaking is a life-long task.


Beatriz Badikian Gartler was born in Buenos Aires
and has lived in Chicago since the early 1970s.