A Poem for the Pandemic

Tom Toles - Washington Post

A kind man asked for a poem
to console us in a time of pandemic,
to give us hope that we will emerge from this
better than we have been.

I remember:
a line of military trucks moving slowly
down Italian streets,
come to collect the dead;
a hallway in a U.S. hospital,
filled with stretchers, each one
holding a body in an orange body bag;
a doctor, sitting on the floor,
head in his hands, weeping;
a terrified old man looking at me
over his face mask:
never did we think we would be
living through a time like this,
after everything we've survived already.

But I also remember:
smiling Italians standing
on their balconies, singing,
faces golden in the evening sun;
a Canadian girl on her porch singing
the national anthem;
a row of police cars and fire trucks,
lights and sirens on, slowly rolling
past the hospital,
a thank you to exhausted doctors
and nurses, in tears, but smiling bravely,
outside the hospital doors;
Dr. Bonnie, who has become a folk hero
for flattening the curve in B.C.
with her humble, clear, daily reassurance
and guidance.

The best of us comes out at such times:
people are helping others everywhere.
We re-learn what we sort-of knew:
that we are all connected;
what happens to one happens to us all.

If we have made poor choices, as a species,
we can learn from this and make better ones,
elect intelligent leaders, demand earth-friendly
stewardship of this blue and green boat
we sail through space.

Mostly, I take comfort in
Mother Nature herself,
generously unfolding another beautiful spring
outside my window.
When we act with love
towards each other, this planet
and all its creatures,
earth is already beginning to heal.


for Bjorn, at dverse: he asked for a poem for the pandemic that would offer some comfort.