Goodbyes/What to Say When Speechless

It wasn't announced in the previous issue, but London Fog #27 that appeared there was the final installment of the web comic. It's been a fun long run, and we'll miss those kooky Londoners!

On a more somber note, I'll miss my friend Gene Hirsch. I'll miss sitting across from him at workshops and most of all, the surprising swoops of fire and tenderness in his elegant poems. I'm glad he got to hold his latest collection in his hands before he left. You can read three of his poems and Judith R. Robinson's introduction to them in this issue of Uppagus.

Goodbyes are difficult; living in "interesting" times is even harder. So often these days we find ourselves speechless. And I've already said what little I had to say on the subject of these days. But we can't give up and lapse into permanent silence. Not while it's our time.

In that spirit, I'll borrow the words of others when I don't have my own. The beauty of Uppagus, really, is other people's words. It's why I keep doing this. Here are some more from a book I read at the beginning of this year:

But in a world turned upside down, things I thought were mine and mine alone, can be taken away much more easily than I would have imagined. If my body were cut up in pieces and those pieces mixed with those of other bodies, and then if someone told me, "Find your left eye," I suppose it would be difficult to do so.
— Yoko Ogawa, The Memory Police

I'll keep it up—and you all do the same, OK? See you next time.