A poetic offering which expresses the overwhelming uncertainty that gripped many following the 2024 presidential election…
by: Cheryl Caesar
On the first day our Facebook pages went black.
We drove to work through a film of tears
and hugged each other in the hallways, unashamed,
and in the women’s room. We talked about renewing passports,
and families in Canada. We avoided referring
to the beginning of The Handmaid’s Tale. We went
on to meet our classes, or conference with students
who complained, “I didn’t know
this assignment would be so evidence-based.”
We kept our blurry eyes front, and flowed
through the day on a current of work and love.
On the second day, we posted galaxies and poems
of resistance on Facebook, and the numbers
of suicide hotlines. And Joplin’s “Solace” was playing
on WKAR on the way in, and the sun
reached a few gentle fingers through the clouds.
So at work we taped the resistance poems
to the inside stall doors in the women’s room.
In the halls we wondered how the Refugee
Development Center was doing, how we could help.
We went on to conference with students who said,
“I just kinda smushed two facts and two sources
together,” for the sake of convenience.
And we slept several hours each night, albeit
with Ambien, which we had been off for three months.
And now I have to admit that I have no idea
whether anyone has gone back on Ambien but me.
But it feels so much better, stronger, safer, to say “we,”
like Offred in The Handmaid’s Tale, explaining,
“We put the butter on our skin.” She had no idea either.
But a friend had posted on Facebook, “This is no reason
to break your sobriety,” so I know others are tempted
to temporary oblivion, and I kind of smush
the facts together. Which is I guess
a definition of fiction. On Monday I will see
the fact-smushing student, and tell him, “So maybe research
is not your jam. Maybe you prefer
fiction. But in these times, submerged in a flood
of information, wouldn’t it be good to have a few tools
to tell the difference?” I hope it will work. I hope
he still believes in some kind of truth. Yesterday he wrote,
“I used a reliable source but the facts were wrong. I learned
not to trust the internet.”
Cheryl Caesar is a writer, teacher of writing and visual artist living in Lansing. She is an associate professor at Michigan State University, and does research and advocacy for culturally-responsive pedagogy. Cheryl’s chapbook of protest poetry Flatman is available from Amazon. Her protest poem, “Grass,” recently appeared in Writers Resist.
