Читать книгу The Quarantine Review, Issue 4 - Группа авторов - Страница 8

Outside the COVID-19 testing centre

we are erring on the side of contagion,

ignoring the spray-painted lines six feet apart

to give each other more breathing space.

A woman sets her open purse on the broken

sidewalk with every pause and I want to say I know

it’s heavy but everything could be toxic, we

don’t know what is toxic, but I don’t want to

worry her; not everyone subsists on fear.

A nurse’s name tag catches the sun as she guides

a white-coiffed woman by the elbow, from

a wheelchair to walk two hundred metres

to the start of the line. Ahead, before the second turn,

a mother wearing a sari blouse hoists her sleeping toddler

higher over her hip and I know I could never

have held my son like that, for so long,

at that age, or in this heat. She is far stronger

than me, all the times I’ve wanted to give up.

Even the cicadas here sound depressed

between the abandoned government buildings.

Two hours further, I am wondering who else

is wondering where we rank. Who gets considered

expendable only ever hinges on who gets to decide.

A lesson history tried to teach us. I suspect

I should write a poem about that, so I scramble

through my messenger bag for a notebook

but all my fingers keep finding is my jackknife.