Because I don’t know how to write poetry, let’s call this a prosey.

Infection

It came on us as a chill
A sad bad shiver
In the crest of years between day and night
Most forgot the methods of prevention and called it providence

Feed a fever, starve a cold

But we do remember the heat
Weighing on our eyelids
So the way ahead began to blur and fracture
Hearts shriveled, brains brittled while we pretended it was nothing

Starve a fever, feed a cold?

Pretty shiny anger, blade-sharp hate
We were perfect moths
Our jaws and fingers ached with partisan passions
Mad acts, desperate defenses triggering entire communities

Feed a fever and never grow old

Rattling coughs, blindness and bursting hearts
Foolishly distracted us
All real manifestations, but far from the truth
Every bar lowered, the horror of us remained breaking news

Starve a fever til your teeth grow mold

The infection hid in our hollowed bones
Quiet as a cat
A thousand boring inquiries began
While we burned the world down to prove we lived

Fuck a fever, fuck a cold

If you survived the long-rolling heat
The rot started up
And still the contagion eluded all efforts
To name and contain and promise we would again be sane

Starve everything

Social distancing felt like social media
Only more authentic
No more sharing, no more caring
We husks learned to keep our thoughts to ourselves

Feed nothing

Huddling in the basements of our being
Survival promised nothing
But the quiet gave space to appreciate what we had become
Carriers of the latest mutation, reborn, resilient and waiting