Exquisite Corpse

I didn't realize, until recently, the connection between Hedwig and the Angry Inch and the surrealist tools with which I have been playing on Language Is A Virus.

"One strategy the surrealists used to elicit imagery from the unconscious is called the "Exquisite Corpse." In this collaborative art form, a piece of paper was folded in four, and four different artists contributed to the representation of a figure without seeing the other artists' contributions. The first drew the head, folded the paper over and passed it on to the next, who drew the torso; the third drew the legs, and the fourth, the feet. The artists then unfolded the paper to study and interpret the combined figure."
from Encarta: IV. Surrealist Techniques

Obviously Hedwig is the Exquisite Corpse, emotionally and physically, and the lovers in his life, e.g. mother, soldier, rock star, are the artists that tattoo their corner of Hedwig. Thankfully I don't think that Hedwig at any point wishes to become a blank page over the messy collaborative work that he has become. Love is about change. They say that you cannot change someone, even if you love them, and it may be true that you cannot control another's change. However, I believe that love is change, and if it hasn't changed you, you cannot be in love. If a past lover has not marked you, then you were never really in love.

I've got it all sewn up
a hardened razor-cut
scar-map across my body
and you can trace the lines
through misery's design
that map across my body

a collage
I'm all sewn up
a montage
I'm all sewn up

A random pattern with a needle and thread
the overlapping way diseases are spread
to a tornado body
With a hand gernade head
and the legs are two lovers entwined

Inside I'm hollowed out
Outside's a paper shroud
And all the rest's illusion
That there's a will and soul
That we can wrest control
From chaos and confusion

a collage
I'm all sewn up
a montage
I'm all sewn up

The automatist's undoin'
the whole world starts unscrewin'
as time collapses and space warps
You see decay and ruin
I tell you, "no, no, no, no
you make such an exquisite corpse"

I got it all sewn up
a hardened razor cut scab up across my body
and you can trace the lines through misery's design
that map across my body
a collage
I'm all sewn up
a montage
I'm all sewn up

[Hedwig] [Exquisite] [corpse] [lyrics] [surrealist] [collaborative] [poetry] [love]