Poetry: Panda-demic

by Bee Neilsen

Pandemic
or panda-demic
If the dark circles
Are anything to judge by.
I throw up a peace sign
On the pedestrian crossing
To show you I’m smiling
Under the mask
My mother sewed me
And sent me in the post.
I haven’t seen her in eight months;
Mothers Day, her birthday, mine,
Lost.

To live and live well
Under the sword of Damocles
Is a knife edge balancing act
Between wanting to
Hold strangers
And love harder
And not poke the
Immune system bear.

“It’s going to be ok”
I say to the bottle blond boy
At the brew bar
Where I’ve been day in and out
Living under the long shadow
Of not if, but when.
Because this is the Titanic
And I have seen
There aren’t enough lifeboats.
I’m playing that violin
For you
All of you until
The end.