Mysteries of the Red Planet: the Objects Speak

One of the games at last night's event for the Mysteries of the Red Planet exhibition resulted in a collective poem, co-written on the spot by all the exhibition visitors and then performed by SLAG as part of a poetry reading at the end of the evening.

Each visitor (and SLAG member) was given an object at the beginning of the evening and told to hold onto it. At the end of the evening, we all then wrote down the message – a sentence or phrase – our object had given us. This was the resulting poem:

This tiny mirror has told me it is a time-travelling object that allows the user to escape to their past lives
The future unknown
I am your familiar and I want to be loved, but I am too hot for comfort
Form arises largely due to the imprecisions of lines
Don’t trust a hairdresser in this margarine bake
A piece of magical hair, once buried at sea and really, really rusted …
General strike now!!
My naked soles of fangs and claws, my contagious footprints, and that’s why they kept me hanging, halfway down the well so heavy and full of sleep
The warrior from the past looks sideways and sees a future moon in the sky
By the water glue was abundant and coloured
My eyes burn like the soles of my feet
Look I’m not pretty, I’m a bit complicated and I never seem glamorous to others who don’t know what I am for. To those who know and understand what I am about – they get it! The others, the ones who don’t know, just can’t figure me out. It would be great if they thought I was at least mysterious – but mostly they just think I am junk
A palming calming hollow bleed will exit the place
This object is the last remaining piece of an ancient beast with magical properties
You are complete, and you always will be. But you are really, really filthy
How the two – tries to bike – with their chased bodywheel
My biomechanical limbs need no sustenance, but they won’t bleed without the servo
I float like a compass in the waters of the skull
A series of elements in extended and continued connection, bent, fraying, clipped and polished. Slightly filthy
As a shell of a person, mystery, friend stayed close
Bones shown on a screen, especially where the ribcage parts look like butterflies or rafters in a cathedral

The exhibition continues until Friday 19 July.