I recapitulate my grandmother:

When her husband died
she traveled the world for a decade
bringing home mementos
but all she really wanted to remember was him
and when that longing couldn’t be distracted
she turned to daytime TV and junk food,
renouncing her life.

Her life got even
by hanging on to her for 103 years.
Finally she refused to eat, and we let her go.

Today, after two plague years
and a decade of undetected
fascist takeover
and a lifetime of burning fossils
I grow numb from scanning the southern sky
for fireballs
and the news for climate catastrophe,
and daytime TV starts to appeal
and junk food starts to look good
and I’m tired of being ashamed
for doing too little to stop this
and I wonder when I’ll stop eating.

20 March 2022