yasser musa

Tea With Trump

Published at Katie Numi Usher’s LAB491 North Front Street, Belize City, Belize20 July 20175:00 am - 10:00 am

Tea with Trump is a poetic happening that occured from 5:00 am to 10:00 am on Thursday 20th July, 2017 inside Katie Numi Usher’s LAB4 at the Image Factory in Belize City. Artist Yasser Musa spent five hours compiling, editing, and publishing this e book Tea with Trump and a 10 minute video with the same title.

cover art: Donald Trump

by Michael Gordon, acrylic on canvas with wooden window frame

2017

LAB 4:11text: Katie Numi Usher

Much earlier than I was able to arrive artists Yasser Musa and Micheal Gordon had started the LAB event Tea with Trump. When light was slowly caressing the city. Some out exercising, some sleeping and others, the early morning workers, already an hour into their day.

I arrived at 6:30 a.m. and Briheda Haylock, Michael Gordon and Yasser Musa were inside the Zen like space. This space which Yasser had actually set up the evening before with Gilvano testing the light and also, mounting, deciding how to furnish a space of contemplation of the geo-political space since the orange one rose to power. When the space was ready, we three left, the day ahead would be “YUGE!” to quote Trump.

And Yuge it is. Michael Gordon has been working on capturing the orange carefully. One must be faithful to a hue that is uniquely obnoxious. He has offered to brush to keen lookers, telling them to ‘katch wa ting deh” with a smile.

As flute meditation music plays, the ones I would play on youtube to quiet the thoughts and find sleep, Yasser has been diligently creating a pdf of his poem for tea with Trump. Quite possibly the artist’s greatest poem. Great in its honesty, its rawness, its realness, its logic and poise in the face of provocation and raucous.

A bomb was dropped on the globe on November 8, 2016. An infamous day and the rise of Trump. The rise of reaction, violence, misogyny, homophobia, intolerance, facebook rants and cyberbulling. The rise of class wars, ableism, sexism. The rise of all these ills to the commonplace, the mundane, the “grow up” and “get over yourself” if you seek redress.

Flags of anger, entitlement and hate fly high and hard in the breeze of the rise of Trump. Tall towers telling people if you are not white, straight, male, rich, you don’t have a voice.

This action by Yasser, this happening, inviting people to reflect and drink tea and commune in the face of reaction and isolation is beautiful in and of itself. This Zen is what we need in this POTUS-twitter-scarred and reflection-parched world.

yasser musa working on Tea with Trump

Michael Gordon paints Donald Trump

Invitation for Tea with Trump

Let us begin by paying homage to Andrew Jackson

You, Mr. Donaldpaying tribute at the Hermitage in Jackson, MississippiI know you would want to go back in timeTo the Civil WarWhat the intellectuals call the crossroads of the American beingAnd make a dealTo Slave or not to SlaveCut this land, cut this bodyThis American dream born in red native bloodBuilt with black bodiesWhite wretchedness planted across plains and deltas

You, Mr Donald Sitting on a moonlit night in MarlargoOn the Florida coastYour special guest Xi Jinping A super power summitYou guys eating chocolate cakeYour finger on the buttonBombs over Syria

At your embassy in BelmopanA massive bunkerA salute to the death of architectureYour government workers stamp cancelledOn our Minister’s VISABut he has no interest in going to AmericaHe will stay behind your big bad wall

Mr Donald, Let me pour the teaBetween sex and NetflixBetween Facebook and sleepWhat is this shame?Vicarious living inside Your television civilizationTextured with trillions of websitesSarcasm screensWe watched your election night resultsBut we still can’t voteWe use your social media That our fingernails twitch and breakWaiting for commentsTo satisfy our edgy, needy desires forHoping for an avalanche of acceptance

Mr Donald, Everyday you ignite the worldWith your wordsSometimes I want to shoot the fucking TVYou talk loan rassBut this is not meAnd still Jake Tapper does not like you

You appoint your son in lawTo run the world at 36“As primary point of contact for presidents,Ministers and ambassadors form more Than two dozen countries…”To broker middle east peaceSolve America’s opioid epidemicDiplomacy with mexico and chinaReforming care for veteransReforming the criminal justice systemReinventing the government and making itWork like a businessWe never hear him speakWhat is the sound of his voice?

Sipping green teaFrom a San Francisco shopIt is easy to think from the West Coast How horrible the world has becomeJust months ago a beautiful black familyOccupied the white houseJust weeks ago the pride of the empire wasMade to seem alrightThen like an exit though the gift shopArtists without authorship Writers went into the artic to tell tales of Madding meltingPenguins walking on thin ice

The Rio Grande suddenly Became a crash pointAnd who will build the wall?Less than two hundred years agoThe your empire started piling up new states

With names like Texas,

California, Nevada,

New Mexico, Arizona,

Utah, Washington,

Oregon and portions of

Oklahoma, Colorado, Kansas,

Wyoming and Montana

Now Vicente Fox had to

drop the F bomb

“We are not paying for no

FUCKING wall…”

Soon sons and daughters Of the former confederacyAmass in their dusty trucks Along the new post-modern frontierNot since Qin Shi Huang organized his peopleHas a wall Become such a spectacle Of the global imaginationForced with rammed earth From spring to authumTo protect the Quin Dynasty

Every day you are under indictmentI love how you make Twitter your testimonyHow every afternoon your Republican friendsHide under their desks hoping the RepublicIs recognizable on the outsidePopping Percocet like skittles Across the mighty Potomac

Now Princess Ivanka must keep her coolAs German journalists try to psychoanalyzeHer daddy issuesWhen she was pregnantShe swam in the warm waters of BelizeBlue green sea like deCaprio’s eyesI imagine she would drink tea with names likeIron Goddess, Oolong or Jasmine

Putin HackingWe live in a competitive world and weAre not among its leaders, first words on becoming president# 1 song – A Man Like PutinHe is a very beautiful man - musicianI looked the man in his eyeFound him trustworthy I was able to get a sense of his soul– George W Bush

How fast is the news, now?Breaking and bombasticAnalysis is analThinking is tiringHow do we grab a pussy

And type at the same time?

Self actualizePourOne cup at a timeLightning inside our cortexOur attention is a commodityOur brain cells particles for electronic participationIn ancient Japan, pouring teaWas a processAn acknowledgement that timeIs for negotiation

Ten years ago I stopped using my cell phoneNow I am lostDisconnectedDistantDetachedSo far all your tweetsI’ve had to readFrom second hand sourcesLike MSNBC

NBCNational Broadcast CompanyThey gave you your big breakThe world was your apprenticeYour oysterNow the same CompanyIs crying foulSaying you are a monsterA media concoction Post-modern Frankenstein

What if tea could just endThe senate investigationsWhat if tea could just endAll the fake newsWhat if tomorrow you suddenly and inexplicablyStopped tweeting.