Shelter

They are home, most of them, eating the shaved ham and avocados, loud with each other and stomping to mark lost known space. How long will this be? No one knows, not yet, though the entire panicked world has a theory. The shelves are gutted, big box curettage and the check-out guy shares a meme that has traveled from San Juan to Shanghai, hinting at the punchline, which is death. Pandemic. But isn ’t that just a movie, a board game, a thing discussed on faraway tongues Isn’t that not our knowing? Why can’t we, how come, my daughter asks, convinced in her own plum fecundity she’ll be alone forever. This is temporary, I say, believing. We have to help the world and each other. But she i s stuck in the bottomless tangle of her bed sheets and what was supposed to be Life’s Greatest Moments The Best Year Yet is looping behind closed doors sorry and sorry so sorry. Look at the sky, I say, how big it is. Don’t forget your mask, I say, while outside above the tree line and over the l ast faint ridge I spy a small thing Flying.
Source: JAMA - Category: General Medicine Source Type: research