{"id":1131,"date":"2022-11-16T19:00:28","date_gmt":"2022-11-17T00:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pensivejournal.com\/?p=1131"},"modified":"2022-11-15T20:43:03","modified_gmt":"2022-11-16T01:43:03","slug":"gratitude-works-a-post-pandemic-poem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pensivejournal.com\/poetry\/gratitude-works-a-post-pandemic-poem\/","title":{"rendered":"Gratitude Works: A Post Pandemic Poem"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gratitude works<\/em> they say,
\nbut that has sounded to me like
\ncount your blessings<\/em>
\nin 21st century clothes,
\nand didn\u2019t we try
\nto end all that,
\ndidn\u2019t we see
\nthat we are all half empty cups
\nsipping on what there is of our lives
\nwith its grit and aftertaste,
\nisn\u2019t it just what we swallow
\nto quench the thirst of our compromises,
\nagain, and again?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I thought maybe
\nthey don\u2019t know anything about
\nthe tragic collision
\nof the already<\/em> and the not yet<\/em>
\nthat happens
\nat every single intersection
\nof every single hour
\nthese days now that
\nmy children are young men
\nand time has stamped righteously
\non those days they admonish us
\nto savor.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I thought maybe
\nthey don\u2019t know anything about
\nwhat happened that summer
\nwhich was that some of us had the same
\nbad dream over and over
\nand others of us changed our Facebook logos
\nand went out to be among others
\nmarching masked in the streets
\nto that same mournful drum
\nnot all of us had ever
\nheard before.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I thought maybe they don\u2019t know
\nhow Myra\u2019s mother died from Covid not after
\nshe got to the hospital,
\nbut because she did,
\nor about all the workers
\nin the meat factories for whom
\nthere was no remote work but the same commute
\non rutted roads
\ntheir tiny funerals
\ntheir bewildered children already
\nhome from school.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But now, ever since this season turned
\nand we let our November campfires
\n-where we had tried to enjoy our blanketed company
\nfrom far away
\nbut instead had fretted about politics in the dark burn down,
\nand we returned to these old rooms,
\nwith the windows open,
\never since several
\ncame back from
\nthe virus despite that
\nso many,
\nso many,
\ndid not, ever since
\nwe realized we didn\u2019t
\nhave to live by lies alone<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I began to try it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And I decided I would not bow down
\nto those Gods of erasure and their tricky
\namnesia-inducing schemes
\ntheir monetizing memes,
\nand it worked.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And I decided I would not forget
\nthe baking and the card games
\nof our lonely winter
\nor community care
\nor decarceration
\nor mutual aid<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I decided I wouldn\u2019t go back
\nTo the normal I had been waiting for.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Since then I have been saying thank you.
\nThank you. <\/em>
\nThank you.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gratitude works they say, but that has sounded to me like count your blessings in 21st century clothes, and didn\u2019t we try to end all that, didn\u2019t we see that we are all half empty cups sipping on what there is of our lives with its grit and aftertaste, isn\u2019t it just what we swallow…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":284,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"issue":[11],"coauthors":[213],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nGratitude Works: A Post Pandemic Poem | Pensive Journal<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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