Naomi Shihab Nye, “Sometimes I Pretend.” A Maze Me: Poems for Girls

“In this piece, Mendieta spilled a large amount of what appeared to be chunky blood over a doorway and sidewalk on an Iowa City street. Then she removed herself from the scene and, from a distance, photographed the reactions of various passersby. […] It intimates to passersby that a grievous and dramatic injury has taken place, but it gives no explanation and, more important, no recourse to action. It may incite horror, concern, compassion, and revulsion—in short, pity and fear—but it doesn’t offer anywhere for these feelings to go. […] Each pedestrian’s only real choice is to walk on by, which looks from the outside—and likely felt, on the inside—like an uncaring abandonment, even if of an indeterminate or imaginary entity. […] And somewhere out of sight lurks Mendieta, a voyeur of each passerby’s involuntary voyeurism. […] People Looking at Blood says, Look at this pile of carnage, with no clear story, source, assailant, or victim. Just look at it. Now look at others looking at it. (And I will be looking at you looking.)”