Audio transcription:
With long talons on feet and fingers and scruffy thick hair, we move slowly. Fluidly, awkwardly, heavily.
We survive a heatwave, extremities doubling and then tripling in size, itching and prickling, I run them under cool water for relief.
I wrap our tight skin and oviform body in a soft lycra playsuit, surprised by the catcalls and wolf-whistles an egg receives in the street, when so much of misogyny is based on ownership and control. But perhaps all they noticed through their white van windows as they sped past were juicy ‘feminine’ globes. With no hesitation my sister flips her middle finger towards the road and throws a piercing glare, ‘FUCK OFF!’
A message arrives in my eggbox, ‘would you love to submit bellyselfies of your huge swollen egg belly?’, followed by several more from what I would describe as, ‘Eggochasers’, occasionally aggressive and demanding a response. Block.
Lying on my back, I contract my pelvic muscles to changing speeds and rhythms. Squeeze two, three, four… Tightening my cervical passage feels counterintuitive, strengthening my already powerful pussy grip, but I’m told it will help.
Struggling to reach my own clit, I search online for sex toys. Now, a system of glowing golden bouncy orbs and throbbing soaring hormones, my body and all of it’s convex curves pangs to be touched and enjoyed.
Sometimes I lie awake at night or in a steamy swamp of water and I feel the warmth and care of our co-creators, engulfing us in sweet sticky love, catering to needs we didn’t even know we had. Other days my face fills with angry hot fear as I remember all the times I skipped their minds and I wonder if there will be a day when we will both fall out of their thoughts. I prepare myself for this eventuality, as I have many times before, and wash my sweaty tears away for now.
With swelling expanding roundness, bone joints soften and move to make more space for you. Muscles so malleable, refluxing acid rises through me like a rumbling volcano. I think of the hot air balloons that would calmly float just a few feet above the house when we were kids and the overwhelming blasting sound of the flame burner within.
We bounce together on a bright blue space hopper from Decathlon with a smiley sticky-out-tongue face. Naked, at 3am, in the dark, relieving some painful tension. Before travelling to the next place, I pull the hopper’s plug and lie on top of it to deflate the air. As I become engulfed in the thick gummy plastic, I imagine this must be a bit how you feel, moving and shifting, surrounded and supported by a cushiony mass.
We survive an attack from hotheaded fascist police. Pushed up against the van, I could feel them squishing us. Detained pre-existence. I wanted to spit in their ugly smug square faces. Is that why you danced to KRS- One’s The Sound of da Police when it came on the telly? Stomp! Kick! Punch! Woop Woop!
We’ll teach you how to deal with these fuckers but hope you never have to.
Protection mode has been fully activated and my eyes squint critically at anyone who comes slightly too close. That person walking three meters away with an umbrella in their hand looks suspicious. This feeling is so embedded in me that the gentlest accidental touch on my skin while I sleep can stimulate a ferocious whack of my arm as I wake up, instantly fight-ready, looking for a source of danger.
I receive more messages but this time, from nosy-parker types. Most of them go ignored. I don’t have the energy to explain over and over again that eggs don’t have genders and that presuming they do is very boring. The obsession with the genitals of the unborn is an honestly disturbing practice. This egg is much more than THAT, we are gooey and lucid, magical fluid, filled with vigour and spirit.
We are not ‘Daddy’s Little Princess’ written on a tiny pink onesie in a curly font with minnie mouse ears and a crown. We are not a ‘Boob Man Just Like Daddy’ written on a tiny blue onesie with a picture of a pint glass filled with milk. We are a LIFE GIVING EGG KING. Your treatment of us cannot be predetermined by this one detail of our anatomy, if you please.
I’ve been writing you love letters, Dear Egg, explaining why I would bring you into a world like this one… on fire, in flames. You have the softest, most resilient, eccentric and diverse welcoming committee and together we will prepare you for all of the sweet and difficult experiences awaiting you. It has truly been an honour to host you and be your humble vessel on this journey. Thank you for travelling with EggKing Eggways! I’ve acquired a gift for you that I hope will remind you of your potency, “Is this what it feels like to be one with the Earth?” We will always be connected but not attached.
We are told to engage in positive visualisations of your arrival but all I can imagine is being a humanoid slip’n’slide. Water World Stoke-on- Trent’s cervical Space Bowl, you will shoot out into the pool with ease. It doesn’t quite match up with the Live Laugh Love affirmations recommended but I think it still counts…
Together, we are reaching the size and status of a planet now with our own gravitational pull. Soon this egg will be cooked and ready to crack.
Method:
– Marinade for several weeks in raspberry leaf
– Massage in grape seed oil, concentrating on the perineum
– When the egg begins to rhythmically surge, prepare a 5ft x 4ft pot of water
– Add cramp bark, wild yam and motherwort, projections of sea creatures and ambient music
– Gas and air are optional ingredients
– Simmer at 37 degrees celsius
– And breeeeeeeeeeeeeeathe
Words by Laura Lulika aka The Egg King
Laura Lulika is a crip (sick+disabled) artist and researcher. Working predominantly with video, sound and performance, their practice explores themes of care, sexuality, labour, sickness and performativity in the everyday. Their work is driven by the rhythms, movement, and rituals within daily activity. Looking at accessibility from various perspectives, Lulika attempts to work outside of common capitalist artworld structures in liminal spaces that are not controlled by systems of oppression. Collaboration is key to their practice. They strive to work in interdependent formats which reflect their care needs and the care needs of everyone involved.
Lulika is an initiating member of Sickness Affinity Group which has been active for three years. SAG is a collection of artists, researchers and health practitioners, working with the topics of art, health and accessibility. They function as a support group and working group that challenges the competitive and ableist mode of working in the arts by sharing experiences and information and by prioritizing the well-being and access needs of its group members.
