Vigil for Aaron Bushnell

Aaron Bushnell’s act touched me in profound ways as a fellow anarchist. Foremost was the intricate way he self-organized the numerous details to be sure to care for the beloveds he left behind while also assuring his self-immolation was precisely and unequivocally read as care for Palestinians, and how he took a strategic direct action based on a clear-eyed anarchist understanding of hierarchical power and side-by-side solidarity in a time of fascism and its genocidal logic—and it succeeded, perhaps beyond his own hopes.

I needed to process and honor his death, and without thinking it through, called for a vigil by a river, and suddenly it was clear that lots of folks needed it too and were going to show up. I’d done zero planning; I’d only been feeling.

These days, feelings can be plenty—if we listen to them, and let them shape and hold the spaces our bodies communally crave amid this nightmarish era.

My emotions lead me to craft a circle A out of sticks. It lead my friend @shadow_patterns to paint a portrait of Aaron, and with our friend @zoziebee, we made a DIY altar on the grass.

As twilight came, some 75 people appeared from all sides, clustering around the altar, adding flowers, hand-written notes and art, and home-baked cookies. I offered some words, then many hands lit many candles, which punctuated the now-darkness with warmth. Silence fell for some minutes, until one brave person took up my offer to share; they read a poem they’d just written. Their vulnerability encouraged others to speak from the heart. Someone lead us in learning a song to sing aloud. Ducks flew directly past us, adding their voices. A person laid down a Palestinian flag, then created a “river” on it from fabric and a “sea” with shells, lighting candles in them.

Mourning Aaron became inseparable from mourning every destroyed or lost life in Gaza. Aaron’s calculated risk and loving intentionality had woven that tight bond.

Folks lingered after the vigil, solemnly extinguishing the candles. “Hey, why don’t we leave the organic parts of the altar here, for others to see tomorrow?”

Today, Aaron’s portrait found a spot in @firestormcoop.

#RebelliousMourning

#UntilAllAreFree