I read this week that Louise Glück won the Nobel Prize for Literature this year. Some of her poems I have shared before: here and here. Congratulations to her!
Last Sunday I tried to go to the Family Quarantine Assembly (which is what my brother has named our family Zoom meeting), and failed. For over an hour I tried, but never succeeded for more than a minute or two at a time.
So I wrote about it.
Zoom Poem
Zooming
away from here
to see you all,
I
got sidetracked
by who knows what.
Somehow
I
couldn’t reach you,
just sat here
watching the circle spin,
promising connection
sometime.
A few times
I
reached the virtual room
where you all sat
but only for a moment.
Someone said
I
sounded as though I was melting
and someone else
wondered why
I
was singing.
It stretches out every syllable you say,
someone started to explain
but
I
was already gone
Zooming
away
from there,
from the Family Quarantine Assembly.
Someone said
She’s trying to be here,
and
I
was,
until the meeting was over,
and
I
was left
sitting here
(not there)
alone.
Ruth, from thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.blogspot.com
14 comments:
Oh, I can relate to your doomed Zoom call, Ruth. Living in Switzerland, with all my family in the US, has led to more than a few intermittently connected calls. Your poem captures that frustration perfectly. And yes, yay for Louise Glück!
This poem is utterly significant to me at this very moment, as my internet and broadband service went out earlier, just before I was to meet a student. It was beyond my power to fix. Everyone's having issues around here, seeing one another just frozen on screens. "Sitting here/ (not there)/alone," indeed. Ghostlike, really. Perfectly conveyed, Ruth.
You've captured this moment with the frustration yet the poem reads almost like what those who you heard described. You were trying, but floating away! Well done, Ruth. Wishing you a better connection next time!
Oh Ruth, I'm so sorry you couldn't gather virtually with your family this week. Technology is a blessing when it works and an exercise in frustration when it doesn't. I could feel your sadness and frustration in your poem. I hope next week's "assembly" connects all of you successfully.
So many of us can relate to your poem. This happens to at least one of us every time we try to do a family Zoom meeting. I think you should submit your poem!
Oh Ruth! Your doomed zoom tugged at my heartstrings - a perfect blend of both gentle humour and melancholy. I could feel your experience. I hope your next zoom blooms.
Oh... this is such a good depiction of a sad and frustrating situation. I'm sorry for this. Another bust for 2020. Here's to hanging in there...
I have been there, too, Ruth. It is so frustrating and you explained it so well. Connectivity issues plague me all the time. I had no internet this week for 3 days.
I like the sentiment in your poem and wordplay, and I hope a better connection awaits you… Thanks for sharing both of your Glück poems, I especially like "A Summer Garden" and the "haze of nostalgia that protects all relics of childhood–" would be nice to have some of those around now.
Oh, boy did you capture the experience! Watching that little spinning dial...thinking that you'll have connection any second now. This poem is a keeper. It really sums up life these days.
Thanks for the utterly relatable poem! We've become even more dependent on the internet with the pandemic. Frustrating at times, but I'm so grateful when it works!
Oh my! This is just perfect! You totally captured that sense of fleeting, failing connection. I love your use of zooming!
This poem speaks to me. The lines about the melting voice and zooming away from family, yes!
Oh, this made me ache and smile at the same time. You evoke that ghost-like feeling perfectly, as well as the attendant frustration. I do like your brother's name for the family Zoom meeting. :)
Longing and waiting for these days to change and for us to all emerge stronger and more loving and more present than ever.
Thanks for this, Ruth.
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