“Here is history, how it sounds: what do I love? Remind me.”
— Bin Ramke, “When Culture Was Popular,” Massacre of the Innocents
Those words, from a better poet, echoed with me 12 years ago, and they always run through my head whenever this anniversary rolls around.
The same thoughts, the same memories, the same feeling of helplessness.
Some tempering, though. Some acknowledgement of powerlessness. Some realization of accountability.
I spent the afternoon 12 years ago in my favorite pub of my hometown, commiserating and consoling with friends, some good, some barely acquaintances, all together in the same doubt-filled boat, applying alcohol to our wounds in lieu of better medicine.
Sometimes I think I’m still in that place, still having those conversations, still wondering whether this is how the world ends, neither bang nor whimper but instead the look-at-me destructive antics of fanatics, followed closely by the look-at-you destructive antics of patriots … and we’re all simmering together, oblivious to our fate, a needle in the groove of a record, but the music is so terrible no one really hears the scratch-and-repeat rhythm.
Some day I’ll remember how to spell rhythm.
Today is not that day.
Today is yet another day when I rely on the spell-checker.
Today is yet another day.
A day I’m tempted to make a list, make a reminisce worth reading, make a better memory, make something, anything, preferably a difference.
It’d be easier to say I have no words, but these are the words the I have, and it’s time I at least put them somewhere.
Remind me.
lastgreypoet 