These are just words

Words for no other reason than to write. To get them out there. To put them down on screen. To be a part of the swirling mess of life in this time of madness. On this screen, that screen, my screen, your screen. Until we can push firmly into the body of another human being we barely know with an embrace of love. The inhumanity of distance has given way to the disintegration of our American selves in a way none of us have seen before. We don’t know what to make of any of this. This new normal. This leaderless place, this nation as a tinderbox, ready to be ignited. We took solace in the lack of public violence as we stayed put, shut in our homes, immobile. Until public violence roared in the form of a knee, nine minutes on the neck a black body, until the life left. What is wrong with us? Why do we do this? I have so many questions. Questions for America. Questions I must have answers to before I feel I can move on. How do we heal? What will become of us? Is this the beginning of our ending? Whatever this is, do we have the words for it? Not likely. Like so many other things in our lives these days, we lack the words to properly describe them. This feeling, like grief but different. Like helplessness but different. Like anger, but then again like blind fucking rage at the way things are. We told ourselves it doesn’t have to be this way, so why is it? What will become of us? I have so many questions. The answers will not come from the writing of these words, but in this moment, it’s all I’ve got.