The embodied materiality of relationships between humans and non-humans: considerations from the works of Marília Floôr Kosby and Soledad Castresana

Abstract

The books Mugido [ou diário de uma doula], by Brazilian poet Marília Floôr Kosby (2017), and Carneada, by Argentine poet Soledad Castresana (2007), embrace both the indeterminacy of life that begins and the inevitability of death, without shying away from questioning our responsibility and participation in systems of domination, reductionism, and expropriation. By questioning the division between human and animal, which organizes the way we live, seeing the world and other living beings as resources, the poets summon us to also consider gender relations wherein the patriarchal order separates and hierarchizes men and women, bringing them closer to non-human beings. The poems become embodied, asking us to inhabit them as bodies — flesh — and confront the relationship with death and violence, but also with the pains and joys of those who generate life, in a multiplication of a multispecific love that proliferates among unspecified females. The reflection proposed here seeks to establish a dialogue between the two poetry collections mentioned and the research of Raj Patel e Jason Moore (2017), Vinciane Despret (2021) and Donna Haraway (2022), among other authors, who point to horizons for a good living and a dignified dying, calling us to disarticulation, in a communication always unforeseen, yet rich in meanings.