VOGUE copyright Conde Nast

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Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (1830-1916)

Surrealist Salvador Dalí, Persistence of Memory, 1931

Gentlesoulfolk? One finds oneself bloated from watermeloncholy - the day after. My good peops, ye know that discomfort though hopefully not frequently. When one is full of the excess of a peculiarly fluid emptiness. Ebner-Eschenbach's quote is apt. Also irks. The full quote? "Even a stopped clock is right twice every day. After some years, it can boast of a long series of successes.” A "stopped" or broken ~~clock~~ system will indeed find itself at least nigh altruistically aligned. From time to time. Despite truncated national capacity, a surreal congruence of our stated ideals can - on all three counts - stage a 'happening'. Perhaps, in the absurd interim, a collective bloating remains, patted down by two hands otherwise 'off'.

Too well one recalls both the cringe and correction of commentary following the January 6 Capitol Insurrection. Many politicians or pundits of a particular hue asserted:

"This is not our country."

All due praise to the diversity of discourse - diverting divinely from that initial inadvertently infantile supposition. Professor Eddie Glaude and a refreshing cabal of media collaborators had effectively challenged that narrative

naïveté long before the presidential election - let alone its

insane

electoral certification.

If varying quotes - less prescient than 'air' apparent - might form some summarized response:

"This...is exactly who we are. Not all of what we are, no. But, yes, this is us."

A testament, though tepid, engenders one's nod to progress in newsrooms as this shared iteration by peops of color - at le mic - uplifted. When in da room, we can confront status quo in a timely manner, pricking the bloated illusion of conventional 'wisdom'. By strategically stating this "us", those clarifying were rather compassionate in their inclusive pronoun - indicting less directly. Clearly, their intent, polite as generous, was a conversational invitation. By "us", they did not mean the First Indigenous populous, nor descendants of Enslaved Africans, nor heirs of Chinese exploitation who hammered ev'ry other railroad nail to propel the Industrial Revolution, nor American citizens of Japanese lineage replete with advantageous acreage of lost farms when labor was Camped in Internment. That empathetic refrain of an "us" relieved the weight of ya'll: benefactors of white supremacy and thus unwitting executors of white priv.

RE: the Chauvin guilty verdict, predictable phrasing is bandied about today: "Justice was done." "The system works". One finds oneself tentatively heartened to hear some white privin' perspective articulating the nuance 'twixt justice n' accountability. They say George Floyd's name, lamenting his lynching, whilst acknowledging his family's grief. Ay, conscious folk rekanize where/how 'justice' is. And ain't. Justice fills us up to satisfy; it cannot thus bloat. Yet the latter mention of "the system working" yesterday is a troubling assessment - consistent, alas, with ~~Edward~~ Establishment Scissorhands cutting their own cultural competency.

Even when the clock 'reads right' twice a day, the clock is still broken. Most key, we all know it. We do not deny it does not work nor try to convince ourselves that one minute every twelve hours is enuf. To 'keep' time. All familiar with said clock on said wall know not to rely upon it. To ~~tale~~ tell us where we are in time. When strangers enter, we warn them, "Oh, don't go by that." We wave a hand dismissively at the clock. Our tone is edged in equal parts shame for inactivity and frustration from our own stalling. Meanwhile, that clock - stopped - remains in a prominent position. Shrugging, we admit: "We need to change that clock's battery." Others too - then - know. Not to count. On the clock.

Until it is fixed.

And much like distinctions 'twixt enlightenment versus education or spirituality versus religion or healing versus medical intervention or justice versus jurisprudence, we know that no institution nor instrument can account for the passing of our existential moments. No clock, 'grandfather-ed' or no matter how exalted, is time itself. Whatever 'time' measures, alleged gains and losses seem beneath it, or at least the humanity at time's mercy. Therefore, priv's perception now of some 'gain' from a most tragic loss? Quite telling. What such relays is more precise than any timepiece - wrecked or working.

One is concerned that former officer Derek Chauvin is considered a 'bad apple'. If the dawn of 'modern'-day policing was unregulated slave patrols ere neighboring vigilantes evolved into Klan organizing, is it not fair to refer to 'bad apples' as low-hanging fruit from one branch extended from a solid albeit soiled trunk with its roots infected at seed's supremacist inception?

Until it is uprooted (defunded/reallocated). Until it is replanted (reimagined).

Until two arms prove wider than 'our' current reach - to come correct - allowing two hands to place us in the present.

a clever as compassionate critique

on the implausibility

of POSTness

Til our next 'post', feast upon produce in season...

CV

Wednesday, April 21, 2021

Twicelight

Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

naïveté long before the presidential election - let alone its

electoral certification.