The presidents of Argentina and Chile signed an accord Wednesday settling the final border dispute between the two South American countries. The agreement draws the border through a glacial area known as the Southern Glaciers Field along the Andes mountains that divide the two countries… Long suspicious of one another, Chile and Argentina nearly went to war in 1978 over a couple of islands in the Beagle Channel at Tierra del Fuego, the southernmost tip of the continent… In December 1978, the Argentine military junta sent coffins to the Chilean border in preparation for a war over three small islands in the Beagle Channel… It divides 100 miles of territory in the far southern region of Patagonia known as Hielos Continentales [Continental Ices] in Argentina and Campo de Hielo Sur [Camp of Frozen Ice] in Chile.

Los Angeles Times. December 17, 1998.

IMAGINED THEATRE #308: Block of Ice

 

Agent #1110 shows me a video on his cell phone of a coyote running down my street

The camera follows a coyote who attacks a dog that used to belong to my neighbor

The coyote attacks a squirrel, a cat, and a yard full of illegal chickens

Agent #1110 then shows me a video of fourteen coyotes running together in a pack

Birds, cats, and rodents hang from their mouths

This is on my street, in front of the house they dragged me out of after they spent four months listening to my phone calls

Agent #1110 says: here in the city nature has finally caught up to us

I say nothing and he starts filming me

I look away from the camera and he screams at me

It’s okay, you can cry, you can relax, he yells, as he points his cell phone camera at my forehead 

It’s okay now if you want to rest or whimper or laugh   

But I do not rest or whimper or laugh

And this annoys him

So he asks me again what I want

And I say: I don’t know what I want

And he screams: who are you in relation to yourself? 

And I tell him I don’t know who I am in relation to myself

And he screams: who are you in relation to the state?

And I say: I don’t know who I am in relation to the state

He drags me to the edge of the fenced-in yard and asks me to look hard at the end of the state

There are barbed wire fences around the end of the state

Just as there are barbed wire fences around the beginning of the state  

From where I stand I can see that on the side of the wall where the state begins there are refugees who have lost their homes and their families and their cities

And on the side of the wall where the state ends there are refugees who have lost their homes and their families and their cities

And when the refugees try to enter the beginning of the state, they see a giant billboard that reads: 

 

THE BLOCK OF ICE IS OURS

 

On one side of the wall the billboard is blue with red letters 

And on the other side of the wall the billboard is green with white letters

Where I stand with Agent #1110 in the fenced-in yard at the beginning of the state, I can see the billboards on both sides  

 

THE BLOCK OF ICE IS OURS

 

Agent #1110 explains that there is a block of ice that straddles both sides of the border 

But there are no photographs of the block of ice

And no one has actually seen the block of ice

Nevertheless, on both sides of the border there are signs that say

 

THE BLOCK OF ICE IS OURS

 

Our state, says Agent #1110, insists that we own the block of ice, and our neighboring state insists that they own the block of ice, and the people of each state are convinced that the block of ice needs to be defended because if the block of ice is not defended then the people of our state will feel threatened by the people from their state  

And even though there is no difference between the people of our state and the people of our neighboring state, says Agent #1110, each night the people of our state gather on one side of the border and each night the people of their state gather on their side of the border to sing songs about the block of ice 

They recite poems about the block of ice

They carry signs about the block of ice

They wear hats with slogans about the block of ice

The people of my state and the people of their state feel equally connected to the block of ice even though no one has ever seen it or touched it or smelled it  

Agent #1110 shows me a news clip where a journalist interviews civilians on both sides of the border  

I see a father standing with his kids, each of them wearing hats and t-shirts and holding signs that say     

 

THE BLOCK OF ICE IS OURS

 

The journalist asks: what would you do if they invade the block of ice

The father, two kids at his side, looks into the camera

Speaking slowly and carefully, he says: 250,000 of them could not defeat us

If they touch our block of ice we will slaughter them

If they so much as lay a toe on our block of ice, we will torture them, beat them, it will be a total fucking massacre

We love the block of ice, says the man, as if it is one of our children

We protect the block of ice, he says, as if it is one of our parents

We defend the block of ice, he says, because this is who we are