Wed, 17 December

LITURGY FOR THE EMPTY BOARDROOM Let us gather around the table that remembers. Let us place our hands where the grain runs east. Here is the cup, half-full, growing cold. Here is the document no one will sign. Here is the chair that holds the shape of someone who has already left for the afternoon. We give thanks for the fluorescent host, for the sacrament of agenda item seven, for the minutes taken and the minutes lost. Let the overcast light absolve us. Let the doorway marked warmth receive us. We confess: we were present in body. We were absent in every other way. Go now. The table will keep your place.