Ephemera

Ephemera

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Each morning I sit in silence, time slides, changes
in my heart, a moss covered cavern where its fire
wakes me to a camaraderie of light, my wife waking

upstairs to walk to her window to pray, to gaze
outward at the pasture where Wappinger people eyed
white men making laws to own people and the land.

Art rules this old house, its rough rafters set in earth
as the colony became a state, and Poughkeepsie forgot
its own wonder, a gathering of reeds on banks of a river

Hudson believed would take him to China, his breath
unnoticed these days by the hummingbirds that visit
our door, sounds of their wings like my fingers tapping

my mother’s empty Tupperware bowl, with cake batter
a thin film she let me lick only when I was good, the taste
something I let leave as I sit, waiting to be aware, woke

as some say. I imagine the sun, its fire, its electricity,
waiting for us when we have lived all we can live, hoped
all we can hope, some of us snatched away by the virus,

corona wrath of a world disturbed. Surprised as we
are by nature’s decisions, we refuse to surrender,
to let go of what kills us when we try to control all

of what we cannot see. Our house is now inside me.
It is me, I am it, my bowels and spine its forgotten
birth, my thinning skeleton now its heavy rafters,

my emptiness its emptiness, my fullness its fullness,
or ideas of the breath, our two minds held still by
the fastening of it all, hook and joint, sinew and bone.

We cannot back down

We now confront a second Trump presidency.

There’s not a moment to lose. We must harness our fears, our grief, and yes, our anger, to resist the dangerous policies Donald Trump will unleash on our country. We rededicate ourselves to our role as journalists and writers of principle and conscience.

Today, we also steel ourselves for the fight ahead. It will demand a fearless spirit, an informed mind, wise analysis, and humane resistance. We face the enactment of Project 2025, a far-right supreme court, political authoritarianism, increasing inequality and record homelessness, a looming climate crisis, and conflicts abroad. The Nation will expose and propose, nurture investigative reporting, and stand together as a community to keep hope and possibility alive. The Nation’s work will continue—as it has in good and not-so-good times—to develop alternative ideas and visions, to deepen our mission of truth-telling and deep reporting, and to further solidarity in a nation divided.

Armed with a remarkable 160 years of bold, independent journalism, our mandate today remains the same as when abolitionists first founded The Nation—to uphold the principles of democracy and freedom, serve as a beacon through the darkest days of resistance, and to envision and struggle for a brighter future.

The day is dark, the forces arrayed are tenacious, but as the late Nation editorial board member Toni Morrison wrote “No! This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.”

I urge you to stand with The Nation and donate today.

Onwards,

Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editorial Director and Publisher, The Nation

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