The rain kept me up all night last night,
Probing me with vaccinations
And syringes of endless worry.
Bad enough this pandemic lockdown,
April’s suffered from a virus,
With chills, fever and persistent cough,
Overcast from start to finish.
At least there’s a chance for freedom
In our own small portions of the sun.
I’m holding out for summer
And the healing of its shadow plant.
Coronavirus Pandemic
Easter Prayer
Maybe this stillness won’t precede a storm
But open like a door to a wider blue.
Maybe these winds will flatten the curve
And rain sanitize the land.
For all my friends, this hopeful prayer,
From the heart of one to the heart of all and back again.
Coronavirus Conurbations
The cities of the world are dying,
History rots their foundations from the start,
Animals rush into the city for carrion.
Where humans have died, they take up shelter.
The age of the cities is over.
Men and women live there sick,
Even in rooms, afraid of any human gesture,
More afraid everyday from the news.
Nature is everywhere all around them
But they can never find it.
An old woman with mask at a window
Watches the sunset every night
And thinks somewhere the light is waking
But I will not survive the infected city.
And those who try to leave
Find themselves trapped, detained,
Their temperatures measured, saliva taken,
Part now of the sick masses,
Institutionalized in one of the cells of the city,
Bombarded by a matrix
From which escape is impossible,
Wait for medicines, compliant now, like supplicants.
How will the Lonely Die
And how will the lonely die
And those who are afraid
And those who break the law
And those sick among strangers
And those who come out of their houses
And those who die in their homes
And those on the street
Those who rely on others
And how will the lonely die
How will the distressed die
How will those praying die
With their guardian angels sick
How will the anxious die
How will the impoverished die
How will the hopeless die
How will freedom die
Pandemic 2020
Seems everyone is paranoid,
With more and more cases of Covid
Appearing in the news
Like worry with a fuse.
After all the panic buying
Hoarders must be inside dying,
Grave as any virus
Fear replicates like a virus.
But with the elderly at risk
Won’t wisdom grow sick?
And with our sick in danger
Mercy show itself a stranger?
Enumeration can create the feel
That anything is hyperreal.
You couldn’t proclaim a pandemic
Were not death endemic.
Something other than disease
Blows in forests of sick trees.
When these clouds part
Will the sun be at its start?
Salvatore Ala 