David Keenan – Letters From Home: "Decent skins are shining like fucking comets"

Dear Evanne,

I hope you are well and haven’t forgotten what it’s like to be a raving homoeopath!

I have been in my room, adhering to the general consensus of lockdown for over a week now. Primarily in my room, though out of a well-worn compulsion to stay sane, I have been out every other day for a swift sweat, running to the village and back or leading solo expeditions to the back of the garden, where I can’t help but be swallowed up by vivid childhood hallucinations. I have learnt what it is to be present again and for this I am grateful. I felt sorry for myself for three quarters of a day when the timpiste in the garage resulted in the damaged right paw but clarity came on quickly in a heavy dose, and I’m actually enjoying the shift in approach. Given the nature of things I have nothing to whinge about, aside from my inability to grow a half decent beard.

Stories are filtering through from members of my family who are employed and deployed on the front lines of the Health service. I feel like I should be out building walls when I hear of the altruistic acrobatics performed by the people on the ground, daily. Decent skins that are shining like fucking comets. Stories filter too of people passing on alone, denied and robbed of the essential hand to clutch or the horseshoe of love around the bed. Wasn’t loneliness the biggest killer in this country before the Virus came and started having its way? I heard of a Man in Donegal who sent himself a letter twice a week, so that someone would call to the door.

Things seem to be different now. Neighbours and nature and family and friends and the songs and the barriers seem to be broken in spite of the enforced distance. It seems we’ve become more social. I have hope that, when this cloud of confusion lifts, we won’t revert to subjective amnesia and that this reconfiguration of what is truly important won’t disappear into half-talk and dopamine dreams.

I do miss your company, but I know that going down into the well doesn’t mean that I’ll drown and that we’ll have enough new found realisations to keep sleep at bay for a while when we meet again.

All for now,

Love from North Louth,

The Beacons are lit,

David x

P.S. Through perseverance, the snail reached the Ark.

Read more Letters From Home, written by Bob Geldof, Imelda May, Glen Hansard, Danny O'Reilly and more, in the new Hot Press 'Stay Safe' Emergency Issue – available to buy in shops and order online now.