Abstract
I Feel Funny’s speaker, A Jewish daughter, granddaughter, and aunt is frightened by strangers. Or is she? The overbearing discomfort of ambiguity invades the speaker’s internal world, populating it with danger. She explores colorfully chaotic environments, including but not limited to: a Halloween party, a local dive bar, a puppet theater, and the childhood home. She is a dancer, disembodied by mirrors and trauma, compelled to create circles and find a stage. This collection explores dreamscapes in which animals do things they shouldn’t, like hold up signs, become the speaker’s emotions externalized, and spontaneously multiply. Everyone is watching this speaker, including the speaker. Her mom is calling from inside the house. Should the speaker answer? She deals with family issues and cultural traumas in the only way she can, through the play space of surreal absurdism and fairytale, where the unpleasant things of life can become soft to the touch and maybe even laughed with.