I Think Too Much About The Meaning Of The Internet

My problem was that I still thought winter was coming.

My problem was that I still thought we could all be saved.

Some how.

Some way.

That I would still live by the sea. That I would write a book. That I would finish the script and shoot the movie. That I would learn how to tend a garden. That I would build a pool, and grout a kitchen and lay down tile by hand. That I would have chickens. That I wouldn’t have to worry about raccoons. Or the coyotes that tumbled through the yard. That I read somewhere, most likely in a novel, that even if they only eat one, they kill them all. That I would learn to speak Spanish with the ease I understood it. That I would feed my daughter oranges from the Mediterranean, that we would swim daily. That I would learn how to lay the past down and leave it alone. That I would have patience, to learn how to make challa and braid it. That I would be able to cut my daughter’s hair.

Dogwhistle. I can hear a friend say when years ago I posted a poem on social media, when I was falling in love. Dogwhistle. I think now, whenever I post. A cascade of yellow leaves. A mountain town. The air so clean it could make you drunk. The river still wild. There was a desire to still be seen, to be heard, to be valued. To mean something. Screaming into the void.

Things can be simple. I tell myself. Over and over. The meals. The movie. The poems. The short stories.

A protein. A starch. A vegetable.

How do we continue to go on with our living? I think every minute of every day since the war began. How do we continue to put the word down? When so many people are dying, when there seems to be only prayer left. And yet, I know in prayer, there is answer.