Blue Star

Blast, who I met on Blip, made me this blue glass star and gave it to me at the London blip-meet in June, 2015. Now it hangs in my window, overlooking the Portland skyline. In my mind it stands for unity with the European Union, which was beaten by Brexit; and lately I suppose it also stands for the flawed and corrupt Democratic Party, the ‘Blue’ party that will be running Hillary Clinton for President against the madness of the other major candidate and an even more flawed and corrupt Republican Party. I preferred Bernie Sanders, but that’s not a choice. 

I hope I will say no more about this election in my blips, but as I write this, while Sue is in an airplane on the way home, Hillary Clinton is speaking. I was actually more moved this evening by the speech of a grieving Muslim man whose son died in Afghanistan as a US soldier, than by what she’s saying. I was more moved by the Sanders delegates chanting “No More War,” than by the Marine general shouting “We are the greatest nation in the world!” 

I will vote for Hillary, right wing though she is, and Shaun King explains why I will do that. Because immigrants. Because Muslims. Because black people. I am a queer old woman living on (by American standards) a very low income. I have children and grandchildren who are people of color. I deeply believe that all children are my children, all grandchildren mine. I care about people in this country who are vulnerable because they are houseless, or mentally ill, or physically ill, or marginal in one of thousands of ways: marginal because they are artists, idealists, rebels, misfits, writers, non-materialists, musicians, anarchists, nuns and monks, revolutionaries, free-cyclers, recyclers, environmentalists, actors, and so on. I have friends who are wealthy enough to be able to dream of moving to Canada or Europe if the Republican whose name I will not even speak wins, but I am not so privileged. I have friends who are proud progressives and say they cannot vote for Hillary, they will not; that her hawkish capitalism offends their morality. But I can’t afford not to vote for Hillary. So the blue star Blast made for me hangs in my tenth floor window, and I hope what it stands for is not defeated in this country as it was defeated in the UK. I’ve heard all I can stand to hear about it, and we still have a little over three months to go before the election. So I’m going to turn comments off for a while, and I’m going to take a pause in blipping for a day or two.  When I come back, I will go on blipping and following and commenting and enjoying this community for as long as I can. 

Carl Sandburg’s poem, “Four Preludes on Playthings of the Wind”

3
It has happened before.  
Strong men put up a city and got  
  a nation together,
And paid singers to sing and women  
  to warble: We are the greatest city,  
    the greatest nation,  
    nothing like us ever was.  
   
And while the singers sang
and the strong men listened  
and paid the singers well  
and felt good about it all,  
  there were rats and lizards who listened  
  … and the only listeners left now
  … are … the rats … and the lizards.  
   
And there are black crows  
crying, “Caw, caw,"  
bringing mud and sticks  
building a nest
over the words carved  
on the doors where the panels were cedar  
and the strips on the panels were gold  
and the golden girls came singing:  
  We are the greatest city,
  the greatest nation:  
  nothing like us ever was.  
   
The only singers now are crows crying, “Caw, caw,"  
And the sheets of rain whine in the wind and doorways.  
And the only listeners now are … the rats … and the lizards.