Reader Submissions

Corona -Vorona Days-Ways

by

Sandeep Kumar Mishra

Humanity caving in corona motion

I as sea mouse back to my hide-hole,

an alarm every morn, in bed to ignore 

what seems like minutes are hours 

week and weeks in hibernation

Am I a little lonely bear?

Homesick in my home

put in non Covid-19 home jail 

It feels a creepy clown chasing me

or I am being cornered by zombies,

I work from green home in red zone world

log on for socialising, switch on to remote voice

My body robots repeat eat, sleep and eat 

Is breakfast still breakfast if I have it at 12 ?

Is dinner still dinner if I have cookies for tea?

I blink my eyes, focusing in on the horizon

as if concentration will transport me another place,

Did I just see a butterfly land in that flower?

When kookaburras flying over empty streets,

do they know what is happening to us?

Am I noticing more than I did before?

As lungs feel clear, birds are now planes,

we venue out of the house to

the garden and back in again,

it’s made all of us hermits

the sky is blue now, or is it just me?

now I understand less means more

Relentless panting of traffic and people

is now marathon conscious breath,

we shop to track down others health,

sanitizer in the pockets with face masks 

sneezing a way to attract attention,

Corona warriors on the front line, 

but some people still curse and cry

This thing is non-fiction- health vs economy

even the fiction is dark, but there’s still music

Covid-19 is a hydra- headed challenger

to our modern modality to wake up

buying cheap tack from cheap labour

I wonder why I feel a sense of guilt

when I see others suffering while I am not,