late late

after covid: the get together

The get together, after so long in our own company, terrifying ourselves with commentaries of what we might never celebrate ensemble, again, 

once we were actually convened, together, in a room, played out in the event as if to prove that nothing but tragedy might ever be made of fantasy and so accordingly, as if by some natural order, despite all preparations, travel arrangements and cosmetic affectations, each wish died a death anyway, and quite miserably, since all who were there, even if only in body by then, had tormented themselves similarly with dreams and dreads yet were ill equipped, equally, to address the moment with integrity

and so it was the emperor passed, naked and we were returning, stuck on the M4- and one of us was yet to admit that a sense of utterly and indefensible reliance on and gratitude for all present simply for being, as well as for their getting to ‘the’ get together was co-existent with a balacing compulsion we each and every one of us felt to get away.