But you won't get away from the tune that they play to the bloomin' old rag over'ead

[sovay]

I caught a fragment of the funeral this morning: a black hearse at a slow march on a green field, a bell tolling and drums, bystanders watching through their cellphones. It is not really that the jokes about the Queen celebrating her cybernetic jubilee—Charles having expired of frustration in the interim—were more plausible than the fact of her death in the course of mortal time, but why else do we believe in fisher kings? I hadn't known she was married in a dress embroidered with ears of wheat, as though spelling for fertility. One of the commentators spoke of seasons of death and renewal, as if all the newly televised pageantry were some enormous mummers' play. I don't think I am used to seeing ritual on such a scale; that is the point of it. I keep thinking about people as links in time, as memory palaces. I wish it did not come so automatically paired with the thought of unmoored futures. Far enough down that way lies trying to glue time in place, to hold back the earthquake.

Comments

[sovay]

*reads and contemplates*

I really appreciate that you leave these comments, without which I would not know if you are reading.

[minoanmiss]

Oh good, I'm glad they're not banal. Often you write about things I am just learning about (I learn so much from your journal), so I don't have much to say yet.

[sovay]

Oh good, I'm glad they're not banal.

Not at all! It's really thoughtful. And I would be happy for you to come back whenever you feel like saying something. There is no statute of limitations on commenting.

[minoanmiss]

beams