Today’s poem is Secular and Inconsolable by Noah Blaustein. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual.

In this episode, Major writes… “Some mornings I wake and say, “Today is the day I will turn off the phone. I will ignore alerts to meetings. I will not open the laptop. Today I’ll disregard all that beckons — coworkers, friends, family, pets too.” But of course… I hop up, brew coffee, feed the dog, sharpen some pencils, and get to work answering emails. For those, like me, like most everyone, I’d guess, who struggle to achieve work-life balance, playing hooky should be a national holiday. Just picture it: scores of us abandoning our desks, heading to nearby parks or movie theaters, beaches, or libraries. Can you see it, a nation basking in a self-contained bubble of condoned indolence?”

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