POLITICS AND PANDEMIC

The following entries were written during a period of intense political furor. 

WHAT WORDS 1/6/2021

 

They found each other in the Court Chamber, at the attorney table facing the Bench. The Bench where they formerly sat at opposite ends. All the doors were locked, and the building shut down. In their gossamer forms they eluded these barriers. They looked forward to being together again. She, new to this afterlife; he waited for her. In life, they argued founding principles, each finding legitimacy for their opposing legal decisions. They found commonality within their love of arts and family. Became “besties.”

 

Would she describe what was happening as a tohubohu, the Hebrew word for a state of chaos. She would bow her head and think long before speaking even a single word. He, patient to respond in Latin, rebellium. 

 

They had seen the crowds, seemingly out of control. But were they? They soon realized these individuals, and there were thousands, were on a mission to destroy the democratic principles they so fervently professed and protected.

 

This day, born symbolic, with rules and pomp, allows for each state to cast its electoral vote for the next President of the United States. For this maddening crowd, it was not their man. Theirs is a White Master. Theirs is a man born in richness, living lavishly, a man with whom they have nothing in common other than believing he cares about them. He does not.

 

What say Antonin and Ruth, their spirits from urn or grave, what are they saying to each other? Two, who in their lives of justice disagreed, and fought hard with words for their opposing perceived truths and laughed and wept together at the Opera.