Hello, fellow Magpies. It’s been a very dark week in America, and I would like to apologize to really everyone everywhere. I’ve got nothing. I really feel like I’ve got nothing.
However … Claire, here. I am the editor of this eccentric tiny rambling thicket of beautiful things. I have tried to remain fairly anonymous because I think I didn’t want anyone to know how very small this is. But. In times like this, maybe the small beautiful things are all we have. All we have.
I let myself get crushed by the darkness in 2016. I shut down creatively. I feel bad about that — angry about that — and I won’t let it happen again. I am so depressed right now that art as well as everything else feels beside the point. But I will not let them make me feel that way. And neither should you. Because it is not, it is not.
So I have things I’m working on, and I hope that you do, too. I have stories of hope and rebellion to share. I’m working on that, and it feels good to be working on something. I hope you are working on something, too. I’m working on a very very small story of kindness.
I’ve been thinking, as I walk around town with my head bent low, because I don’t want to talk to anyone who supports racism and rape, but even more, I cry these days when I talk to kind people. I’ve been thinking, when this sore feels less raw, no. no. I can’t be kind right now to people who … Can’t do it right now.
However. Kindness is what we have. So let’s just go with that for now.
I talked to my 18-year-old son the day after the election, and I wanted to tell him that everything would be okay. But it won’t. And he’s smart enough to know that it won’t. History comes in waves. America has been racist and misogynist since before it was born. As it has ever been, so it will ever be. MLK said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” The arc feels very very long right now, but here we are.
I have felt like I’ve been mourning all week. Grieving the death of hope. They want us to feel that way. They weaken us that way. So not now, maybe, but when we gather our strength, we will resolve to not let them take that away from us.
Because hope is what we have, and kindness is what we have, and creativity is what we have, and the people soon to be in power are terrified of all of those things. They’re terrified of acceptance, happiness, love. Let’s drown them with it. Let’s drown them with all of it.
Much love, Magpies. Look out for the vulnerable, look out for the vulnerable. Rough times ahead. Don’t let them break us down.
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thanks Claire.
There are some people I want to be very direct and harsh with right now. I simply don’t know the country I live in anymore. But it’s still our country too. We have to make that loud and clear.
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People are allowed to have different opinions then us, it doesn’t mean they support rape.
Poetry tells us we are the shards, broken, stunning, shining, in places where light and darkness
become deeper then colors and our fragments of love are the only thing true. Poetry is where time
and prayers for our vision fall away, so that a light that is found between the spaces of desire, tells us
that we are not who we think we are, magpies and winter, the skies endless blue.
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I lost hope over 20 years ago. That is in government, and fairness. I fell silent. Why? Because I felt that with each word spoken out loud or published, hundreds came back of the opposite nature, which translated to me that my voice, my protest was only making things worse. So I am silent. I figure I can’t stop the tide, but the nature of the tide is, eventually it retreats. It will retreat naturally. Not in my time, but the timing of nature. So my vision is as tunnel vision, seeing only what’s right in front of me and very close. It is not necessarily the right thing to do, it’s what I do. Grief is a constant. Little joys create much gratitude. Thank you for sharing your heart Claire. I love it.
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