Quarantine

A friend of mine, Leah Korican, is a poet and artist, and she wrote the following poem. Part of it refers to her teaching art to kids on-line during the shelter in place.

Quarantine

Is it the beginning of the end
or the end of the beginning?
I am bundled in my bunker,
you are spinning on the screen
and you are mute
most of the time. I try to teach you
and sometimes you vanish
or type 25 emojis of a heart eye face
and a brown dog and a yellow flower
or show me a crooked drawing
of Garfield on lined paper.

The worriers are worrying overtime.
The stoners get high before noon
The bakers bought all the flour
and yeast and fill the fridge
I know there are others out
there suffering in the headlines but
Everyone I know is fine but not fine
Everyone I know is waiting it out
Everyone I know is getting a little antsy
and only occasionally cryong

Spring keeps on coming
the birds seem more plentiful
and their song is so lovely
but still somehow annoyingly repetitive
the same three notes
I'm grateful I'm the lucky one
Twitter keeps me scrolling
my eye twitching
in rhythm with the outrage

of what was said and I should
just log off now, log off NOW
and someone tweets it's time for the artists
to create a new world in the forty days
and forty nights-
during the flood
the two by two animals