Recent Nearby Seismic Activity:
Date Time Lat Lon Depth Mag
2018/03/11 21:47:01.17 37.93667 -122.30183 6.020 0.69
In Kushner’s post-enlightenment mise en scène from Angels in America: Perestroika (the first draft of which he completed on the Russian River), heaven resembles a leveled 1906 San Francisco, still smoldering from the great earthquake and fire, during which God has fled. The angels stand, helpless, beside a tabletop covered “with ancient and broken astronomical, astrological, mathematical and nautical objects of measurement and calculation,” listening in horror to reports of the 1986 Chernobyl accident on an old radio. Time has stopped for them. Futilely, they wait for humanity to still its movement, its migration, its inquisitiveness, its intermingling, so that God will return.
The people who staff this booth tell me I can change the color of the lights with my mind. By merely clearing my thoughts, focusing on breath and accepting the messages and colors they send to me via earphones and goggles, I can transcend certain ruptures in the universe.
They know this because they have transcribed their own conversations with Christa McAuliffe and the other Challenger astronauts shortly after the 1986 explosion. Numerous conversations with each astronaut, through mediums, have been lovingly and meticulously transcribed on their website. According to the transcripts, the spirits of the dead astronauts, who wait together in a sort of cosmic lounge, recount the explosion, each expressing their hopes, confusions and their transitions into a body-less existence.
Noticing the tape and foil, I wonder how long the apparatus of Enlightenment can hold.
Photo:
Foundation for Mind-Being Research Booth
World’s Fair Nano Conference
Pier 48
San Francisco, California
March, 2018