Why? —after Bob Flanagan and Sophie Cassar

Because a theatre is nothing without an audience. Because fasting before an operation is a form of compulsory savings. Because of polyester surgical sutures. Because it costs a lot of money to be sick and you cannot afford the alternative. Because of mountainous landscapes. Because during the time it takes for Orlan to express that ‘pain is an anachronism,’ your arms and legs are restrained against an operating table in the pose of an emphatic baroque cherub. Because of fertility. Because bending pliers, curettes, clamps, cobb elevators, mallets, retractors and scalpels allow orthopaedic surgeons to cut and remodel bone with minimal damage never measured and recorded by your experience. Because of living tissue. Because chemotherapy may cause a delay or interruption in puberty. Because contemporary operating rooms are windowless. Because Angela Carter writes that ‘our flesh arrives to us out of history, like everything else does.’ Because this is going to hurt. Because there is an accumulation of computer-generated images of tall, slim, mostly white women wearing pink plaster casts to repair non-existent broken bones or fractures. Because you might be reduced to something you cannot recognise. Because the theatre is in operation. Because doctors and nurses need employment. Because of Anne Boyer’s declaration that ‘as soon as a patient lies down on the exam table, she has laid down her life on a bed of narrowed answers, but the questions are never sufficiently clear.’ Because of infection. Because death is checking out the burgundy polish on your toenails. Because medical intervention creates sickness as much as it treats illness. Because it is against nature. Because you are sitting in the front-row seats. Because of nausea. Because enacting self-restraint eclipses all medical procedures requiring anaesthetic. Because four nurse-like figures enter a room. Because as Audre Lorde understood it ‘the only answer to death is the heat and confusion of living’ and ‘the only dependable warmth is the warmth of the blood.’ Because it is clinically proven. Because memory excretes gravity as you rest your body in a bed of tulips. Because pain is not meaningless. Because being wheeled into an emergency ward means keeping your tailored grey blazer safe for dry cleaning. Because this is beyond pain being transformed into pleasure. Because you are waiting for your name to be called. Because although Kathy Acker was ‘terrified of cancer’ she ‘feared chemotherapy more.’ Because you are not granite. Because chlorhexidine is wiped over limbs. Because you are caressed with fingerless rubber gloves. Because of the coral in the ocean. Because you are asked how it feels after being dressed in a backless blue surgical gown. Because of gift and specialty shops. Because of your wounds. Because there are only treatments to no end.

Image: Sophie Cassar, Self Restraint, (archival print), 2024. Inkjet on cotton rag. Dimensions variable. Photography by Amy May Stuart, Photo by Thomas McCammon. Courtesy of the artist.