Poetry and CubeSpace

This feels silly, because I don’t write poetry (and after reading this, you may think that’s a good thing).

I wrote previously about CubeSpace’s financial problems.  While there was strong support (including financial support) from the community for keeping CubeSpace open, owners Eva Schweber and David Kominsky eventually decided it was best to fold the business, since they weren’t sure it would be sustainable in the long run.

Today, several people pitched in to help CubeSpace pack up and get ready to move out of its office space.  I went down to help, too.

CubeSpace has never just been an office space or a meeting venue to me.  It’s been a community center.  I hate to see it go.  And somehow, I needed a poem to express my feelings about that today, even though I don’t write poetry.

Once the comfortable center of bright ideas,
the velvety sofas and chairs and companion tables
are now grouped silently in an empty forum.

Chaos is now the center, where sweaty humans
surrounded by clutches of pens and papers
are coiling and squeezing unruly cords into boxes.

Lift and carry, reach and pull again,
cyborgs share the network of community
even as they pull its plugs and wires.

All signs of life will soon be silenced;
snacks eaten, beer drunk, the stairway dark and empty.
Yet the center will hold, and the crowds still gather to share their light