Letter to Virus-In-Chief

Written on March 20, 2020

If you have a secret 
keep it. Choose your 
targets like a heat- 

seeking missile. 
Take out 
the perpetrator– 

our orange-haired 
monster and his 
stuttery silver-tongued 

accomplices––they don’t 
know where or how 
to stop or start you. 

Absolve the innocents 
and wise ones 
but take down 

the disrespecters 
and dismissers. 
The world revolves and glows 

as ICU monitors flicker 
and beep; germ-guns and bleach-bombs 
against you not yet discovered 

or properly detonated 
against your crazy curated chaos. 
Ill-prepared sycophants 

rail against 
mis-chosen enemies while 
proto-Nero fiddles at his wall. 

During this conflagration 
the sun still shines 
the earth turns 

and holds its center 
while invisible vectors 
writhe and gnaw. 

We seers press back with isolation 
hope and determination 
to stymie defeat. 

Thanks to E. E. Lampman 

Laura Celise Lippman