After the lockdown was over
Did you notice us?
Pairs of dutifully masked introverts
looking furtively over our shoulders
talking quietly among ourselves
Do you want to know what we were saying?
Yes, even amid the sick, the dying, the national shock
of life taking such a turn on a random March day
“Is it okay to think there are some good things about this?”
No parties!
It is actually better for my health
to stay home and read
all day!
And yet…
Are we going to waste a perfectly good pandemic without learning this truth?
We are animals.
Social animals, and we need to be together
Not in exclusive spaces where we see and are seen
Not in arenas where we sway to that one tune
that our own mob knows by heart
See that sign over your silo door
or in your cozy reading nook?
EXIT
Come on out.
Tear down the signs that say
No Loitering
Paint new signs
with shade, with trees, with winding paths that go nowhere in particular
with pools, and benches, and fountains where the little ones can splash
and the older ones can chat
with parks and basketball courts and playgrounds and libraries
No need to paint with words, that way everyone can read it:
Please
Linger here.
I will be the one on the bench, reading in the shade.
You can say hi.
Written after Palaces for the People, by Eric Klinenberg