<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div dir="auto" style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div class="">Weather</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">On a scrap of paper in the archive is written</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">I have forgotten my umbrella. Turns out</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">in a pandemic everyone, not just the philosopher,</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">is without. We scramble in the drought of information</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">held back by inside traders. Drop by drop. Face</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">covering? No, yes. Social distancing? Six feet</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">under for underlying conditions. Black.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Just us and the blues kneeling on a neck</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">with the full weight of a man in blue.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Eight minutes and forty-six seconds.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">In extremis,<i class=""> I can’t breathe</i> gives way</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">to asphyxiation, to giving up this world,</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">and then <i class="">mama</i>, called to, a call</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">to protest, fire, glass, say their names, say</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">their names, <i class="">white silence equals violence</i>,</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">the violence of again, a militarized police</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">force teargassing, bullets ricochet, and civil</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">unrest taking it, burning it down. Whatever</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">contracts keep us social compel us now</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">to disorder the disorder. Peace. We’re out</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">to repair the future. There’s an umbrella</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">by the door, not for yesterday but for the weather</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">that’s here. I say weather but I mean</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">a form of governing that deals out death</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">and names it living. I say weather but I mean</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">a November that won’t be held off. This time</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">nothing, no one forgotten. We are here for the storm</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">that’s storming because what’s taken matters.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Claudia Rankine</div><div class=""><br class=""></div></div></body></html>