The Eloquence

"The prime minister was watching a disaster movie when we found him. We are the media we cried. Run. The insiders ran around wildly looking for the exits. On the face of the deep the ghosts of civilization wailed. The shadow of a doubt dissolved, everyone just trying to understand how what happened happened. Figuring out how became the choicest profession. Don't misunderstand us- we always obeyed the unwritten rules, we always respected the number of minutes allotted for the interview-"

"The calendar lit up with the dates when each thing of value would no longer exist. We reported it exactly, the idea was to leave no trace in our language of grief, regret, despair. Not a trace of us must remain. But where can our lives be hidden we thought as we hurried from telling to telling, permeated with absence."

"It was not our job to notice the rain no longer fell, we were busy tracking who was logging in and logging out of the current war while new faces of God made their appearances behind our backs as always. We checked on our stringers. We called in to get a reading on the deathwatch. You're breaking up. Can you give me 50 words"

Journalists scramble amid civilizational collapse, prioritizing explanations, metrics, and schedules over sensory realities and personal loss. Reporting becomes a procedural occupation that catalogs endings and logs access while attempting to expunge grief from language. Daily routines—checking stringers, monitoring a deathwatch, tracking logins—flatten experience into data points and expiration dates. Sensory cues like rain, smell, and newborn life slip away from attention as narrative supplants history. The information environment hardens into a dry weather that closes in, leaving the aims of the occupation unclear and personal presence increasingly absent.

Read at The Atlantic