DC PLACES ISSUE Holly Bass   A REVOLUTIONARY MOVEMENT OF AIR on finding Washington Circle barricaded with uniformed police standing guard during the IMF/World Bank conference “you’ve changed. you’re not the man that I once knew. no need to tell me that we’re through… it’s all over now, you’ve changed.” It was the summer when all the sistas started rockin’ fans. Some homemade and decadent others store-bought and refined and it wasn’t necessarily especially hot this is washington after all melted chocolate city the fans were the necessary accoutrement for a summer that was more than humid nights and high sun it was the last times and what little bit of freedom left was slowly ebbing away “you’ve changed. your kisses now are so blasé. you’re bored with me in every way. it’s all over now, you’ve changed.” you see, the women still loved the city but the city no longer loved them back the air had turned against them the very air it was happening in every quadrant north south west and east but the sistas felt it first smelled hints of iron in water heavy air noticed the rumblings of otherwise functional air conditioners so they fashioned amulets of feather, balsa, spanish lace sage tea softened set in the sun to dry “you’ve forgotten the words ‘I love you,’ each memory that we’ve shared. you ignore every star above you. I can’t realize you ever cared.” these fluttering gabriels offered no small salvation in difficult times while all about them were losing their heads the women stayed kipling cool and they fanned a vigil of moving hands beating the air with such fragile elements it was not vanity or luxury it was any means necessary it was liberty and justice for all sweet freedom crowding out chaos a small antidote to hate and war love in its simplest shape it was a revolutionary movement of air Writer and performer Holly Bass has presented her work at the Kennedy Center (DC), the Whitney Museum (NY) and the Experience Music Project (Seattle), among other places. Her poems have appeared in Callaloo, nocturnes (re)view, Role Call and Gathering Ground: A Reader Celebrating Cave Canem's First Decade. She studied modern dance and creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College before earning a Master's in Journalism from Columbia University.   Published in Volume 7, Number 3, Summer 2006. To read more by this author: Holly Bass