Forget Me Not

Pharmacists shield behind masks at the corner store

The virus is spreading* – but not as fast as the

germs of fear on the internet

They will suffocate us if we let them

But out in the late afternoon sunshine,

a little boy pokes his stick into the mud with glee

while a moorhen makes its watery landing

A family on bikes gobbles like turkeys as they fly past

a mother, tousling her son’s curls while he’ll still let her

A young girl collects treasures from the rock pile,

pink bike helmet gracing her head unworried

with thoughts of sickness and death

Students recline on canal banks near a willow,

their laughter mingled with its weeping

while a man sits fishing, cemetery

stretching in the distance behind him

How little separates the living from the dead,

celebration from mourning

I breathe the fresh March air into my lungs,

knowing we shall all cross from here to there

But the city is building bridges over the canal,

an ode to life in the face of looming death

Visits are forbidden at the nursing home

but smiles passed through the window

link my heart to the grandmas inside

A man whistles while he walks past

forget-me-nots springing up in gardens

I will not forget.

photo by Lyn D on Unsplash

March 14, 2020 

three days before Coronavirus confinement

*5,614 deaths worldwide as of today