quarantine-contemplation

there were county fairs and musicals.
there were meals shared with friends,
there was embracing and card decks and
holding hands. there was air.
there were dresses, swimming pools,
friend’s houses and thrift stores.
there were gyms in the morning
and June Pride Parades, and
sometimes even what seemed like balance.

now, there are lit screens,
bad art, eighteen-hour periods of sleep,
and too many apps in my phone.
there are microwave dinners,
pajama bottoms and the illusion that yesterday
was three months ago and last year
was only several minutes long.
the air is different.
there was peace and panic all at once.
a reassortment of obligations.
a little ease, with a rush of distrust,
everyone carefully announcing that they
don’t really believe in dying
and that they would simply not be dying
if it meant they could not go outside.

it was a three-month conversation between
ourselves and the world about what
the outside really is and why we have
passionately convinced ourselves that
everything must be external.

you’ll laugh with friends and believe in death again
and know what a week feels like again and maybe
next year, dinner will still be cold in the middle,
naps will be shorter and you’ll take hugs for granted.
there will be the outside then.

A Different Haunting

It was weeks before Halloween and I’m still in my house,
I fell asleep again while watching “Get Out”.
There are no decorations, no special scare.
This year has left my October miserably bare.
In my room, I’ve collected some depression snacks
and last year’s trauma, which I’ve yet to unpack.
It’s pretty obvious now, there’s a slight sort of haunt,
it’s the Ghost of Halloween—she thinks we forgot.
She wants to remind us of holidays past
with parties and costumes and friendships intact
but this year, the killer is not a work of fiction—
there is no man in a mask slowly pacing your kitchen.

It was weeks before Halloween, everything is scary,
I fell asleep again, this time while watching “Carrie”.
I made some more popcorn, then decorated a sign,
that said “Sorry Kids, No Candy This Time,”
I put the sign high, but I hung it with shame,
I turned off lights. Nothing is the same.
They said: “stay indoors, it’ll be over by fall,”
while some had listened, others, not at all.
It’s pretty obvious now: the warnings ignored.
Despite all this haunting, the ghost is still bored.

Unbelievable

I was such an unbelievable girl,
the way I imagined things
and demanded them into realness
with my little fingers. The world
I created that housed things only
evil and glorious to me
was that word: unbelievable.
If I dreamt of an animal,
it existed, if I said things were
hideous and dark, they were, if
I said I invited Death to a tea party,
and he came, he did, if I said
I would only eat croutons, I meant it.
As I grew and my imagination
did, too, I continued to build
a separate world around me.
It wasn’t until I was twenty-four
that my mysterious case of
unbelievable
had a diagnosis.
I knew that maybe no one would
believe me, they said that
women have to do over half of the work
to only half-convince the doctors, but I did it.
The tall man in the dress shirt and tie
asked me if I had any friends
and when I said my best friends live
in my television, he signed the paper
and gave me freedom:
the diagnosis that explained
all things unbelievable about me.

Originally published in 2020 by Coin Operated Press.