Inventing Selves Through Psychological Cell DivisionThe heroic endurance of artist(s) John Dempsey and Billy Tokyo

Adam, the first collector, got to label every other creature, creating the first taxonomy. Collectors ever since have catalogued their finds, documented their history, identified subtle differences. By the nineteenth century, people saw collections as symbolic worlds, full of clues to other places and other times.

Nature is an inexplicable problem; it exists on a principle of destruction. Every being must be the tireless instrument of death to others, or itself must cease to live, yet nonetheless we celebrate the day of our birth, and we praise God for having entered such a world.

Silences that close us off, refusing connection, shoring up the ego at others’ expense—those are dead silences. But the letting-go sort, the silences that hold space or keep vigil for someone else? They are alive.