My Jandek Plague Journal: 6/8/20 "Queen Anne Avenue"

"Resting here so peacefully now/Feeling my best days are coming/And all my troubles left behind." Pessimism is an easy pose to strike and one I can be accused of relaxing into more than once over the course of this journal. It's a "plague journal" though, discussing the pandemic, fascism, and the music of an artist who can seem terrifying to the casual listener (and my self-imposed brevity prevents me from offering the anecdote to counter that claim). I am leery of premature claims of victory, but that does not mean I don't believe in or celebrate the very real victories that have come out of this moment. The communal response to the pandemic--not the political--has been an embracing of shared sacrifice to protect those at risk. The same spirit is on display in the protests: people who'd previously been silent coming forward to say "these are our neighbors and we won't abide their suffering." -6/8/20. "Queen Anne Avenue" from Seattle Friday (one week earlier) (one week later)