The editorial team at Westerly have been amazed to see the variety of brilliant ideas presented at SymbioticA’s ‘Quite Frankly’ conference. Celebrating the bicentenary of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the conference has brought artists and scientists together to discuss their work. For the conference, we set up an online exquisite cadaver game. You can only see the most recent line posted to the poem, and then you have the chance to add your own voice to the mix!
Running the game over the course of the conference, here’s what we saw:
An exquisite cadaver A quiet sad, An angry sad, Lethargic cow Silky puppy so slick and pure lying there so still and yet I sensed a shiver from within pale, devoid of breath cashing in on the rush, poised we come like a flush with a crush, in the hush without end. But not without closure without closure we Mortein the thoughts crawling our walls whilst hosing down the dead corpse lead horse tread norse norse tread lightly Vikings screamed the tree sways the wind breathes the the solitary Predator soldier Searching for heat in space Seeking light in the dusk I crave humanure like a festoon of earthworms descending on a turd. And I crave and I crave and I crave. More knowledge about Astrobiology DNA and fabric manifolds DNA Chauvinism and genetic determinism/eugenics is a portrait of four people However selfish, one is always aware of the very simple, direct need to Have my balls stepped on Earth like this before Like this earth before Prior, earlier, antecedent, and then a point appears with the attributes of zero swirling around the vacancy of null clinging desperately to the remnants fragments, each piece dissolving on impact, protein shakes are getting really popular these days fragments, each piece dissolving on impact, fragments, each piece dissolving on impact, like the severed fingers of a concert pianist injured in a freak industrial accident clinging desperately to the remnants of her testicles that glow in the dark along with her cell phones one pines for the press only to be repulsed Embrace the movement, press, press again, momentum is living enclosed in the tannic dark Plunged in the umber deeps Gasping for luminosity
Now, we’re turning the game over to you! Head over to our exquisite cadaver page and add a line to our poem—we’ll publish the results from time to time.