our viral load
when asked
“How are you doing?”
I often stammer, equivocate,
my best summary?
“Personally I’m doing well.
Empathically I am hurting.”
too many I know are hurting,
too many I don’t know must also be hurting,
today I ventured another phrasing:
“I teeter between Pollyanna and paranoia.”
my default is the optimist,
yet fear and despair are close to my surface,
truths that my subconscious notices
and expresses in the deep night,
viruses aren’t even alive,
according to the restrictive definition we now use,
yet these unwelcome hitchhikers glitch our systems,
as if we are but marionettes dancing
to their tugs on our lines.
by Henry H. Walker
January 7 ‘22
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