When you wake up tomorrow morning,
the Senate will still be dead.
It will not attend your daughter’s graduation.
It will not say “Next year in Jerusalem!”
at your Seder.
It will not offer advice on which lawn service to use
or what types of shingles last longest.
The Senate will not tell you bedtime stories
or remember the year the Washington Redskins last
won a Super Bowl (or even won at all).
When you wake tomorrow
next month
next year
the Senate of the United States
will still be dead.
So, it is best for you to come to terms
and do whatever you must to mourn
appropriately
cathartically
before going on with your life
living your loss
Because it is a loss and let no one say otherwise.
But bear in mind,
the Senate has been dying for a long time
and you were aware that you could not count on it
to come over for Thanksgiving
or Christmas
or not get you into debt
or send your daughter off to war
after all, how many times did the Senate
forget who you were
You kept showing it photographs
reminders of better days
of people it knew who have also passed
you tried to remind it of its forgotten ideas
and values
and how it looked when it was in fighting trim.
So, remember the Senate
maybe even say Kaddish for it
but don’t expect it to fast with you
during Ramadan
or hunt Easter eggs with your son
or bring roasted corn to your tailgate
at the next football game
Because the Senate is dead.
Maybe there is still time to appreciate the last days
of that other ailing giant
the Republic.
Jeremy Nathan Marks lives in London, Ontario. Recent poetry, prose, and photography appear in Apricity, On the Seawall, Red Fez, Barren Magazine, Unlikely Stories, Bewildering Stories, 365 Tomorrows, and Literary Orphans.
