“If this was not arranged weeks ahead with Patrick whom I have known for decades, and if I was not with my dear friend John Killacky, who in the past had intense years in the Twin Cities, I would have never thought about speaking on the program based in the Twin Cities at this time, where many of today’s audience live. 

I am in Japan now but I have been following the news of the murder of Mr. George Floyd, what followed, and the people who have also been murdered before by the forces that were supposed to protect them. 

On the surface, what John and I were invited to offer tonight seemed unrelated. Created in November of last year, each of us voice our “thank you”s and “goodbye”s to our mothers. And that is the piece. 

But I realize, a murder takes away not only a life but also their tomorrow and their otherwise would have been possible full trajectory of life. It also takes away a personal death—an attended, natural death—that my mother had and Mr. Floyd perhaps had wanted. 

The murders upset the victims, their families, their communities, and all of us.

When our mothers died, we were sad but we were not angry. 
Now we are angry.
We will attend to this anger and we will remember this anger. 

Yet the anger is so much deeper and so much more stifling for particular segments of the people, who are closer to Mr. Floyd by relationships and commonalities of color and what comes with that. I am indebted to those friends who remind me that truth.  ”

“When George Floyd was under the knee of his murderer, he was calling out for his mother. He called out, he couldn’t breathe, and he called out for his mother. And Eiko and I made this piece last November, and it was a piece that we wanted to do about our mothers. We thought about the piece when we were at a memorial service for our friend Sam Miller, and it was a way of continuing the dialogue, and what was interesting to us is that during the COVID period, as this piece has moved around now in the world, people are saying it’s really helped them because they couldn’t say goodbye to their mothers or help them reconcile things, and I just feel so lucky to be with all of you right now, and if we can somehow hold George Floyd. Because he called for his mom. So the piece has a different context tonight than it did a week ago.

George Floyd died the same day he was murdered. His mother died two years previously on the same day. ”

“It is partly and hugely because of John Killacky that I have also friends in the Twin Cities. Because I have friends there, I could imagine and indeed feel their emotions from thousands of miles away in Japan. And that makes me feel the weight of this crime. 
Thank you friends who make me know more than I am prepared to know. 

Lastly, because of what has been happening in the Twin Cities, because our friends made a point of being here with us tonight, and because this is the first time I could see this work knowing you are watching, I got emotional. 
Your watching made this showing a performance. Thank you. ”