SISYPHUS is a magazine that focuses on contemporary issues surrounding art, culture, and language.
Has to take such different forms
these days—displays of affection, too.
In lieu of hugs, when friends meet, feet apart,
we touch our own hearts,
we embrace our own arms.
And when I hear of friendships frayed
over measures of protection,
I realize this mask is a badge—
of caution, yes, but also care.
All of us, everyone I meet or merely pass,
is moving through a sea of mystery,
each bubble of breath
may be mine, may be yours.
But ultimately, we know this now,
is ours.
Isolation: cold word, with ice in its veins,
not to mention that other sound, “shun,”
at the end. I think of all those rhymed
relatives: nation, duration, desolation,
ovulation, creation—dozens
of cousins, those blood relations
bound to us by skeins of sound.
Alone, cut off from you, loves,
there’s not much to do but study
a patch of jonquils, seven in all,
half-hidden by an upturned wheelbarrow
at the corner of the toolshed,
their white sockets frilled, rain-spotted,
splashed by in-and-out sun.
Why have I, after all these years,
only now noticed them? Who,
before we came on the scene,
planted them in this out-of-the-way spot?
In isolation, there can be solace,
even as the dying die alone,
even as the dead have no place
to rest, exhausted by their tribulation.
Then there are the other dead,
the red-caps crammed in the town square
howling approval when the king
waves his rubbery arms, shrugs and grins,
ripping sense from every ruined sentence,
spitting back nonsense to wild applause.
I’m thankful for a certain kind
of solitary confinement, the kind
where we’re close by being far.
Here, then, are seven jonquils.
Here’s sunlight on their flared skirts.
I give you their stillness, their brief lives.
When they nod, I give you the wind.
“The Year of the Plague: A Letter,” first appeared in the inaugural issue of Light, an online literary journal published by Lauren Grosskopf, publisher of Pleasure Boat Studio press.
The problem with Trump stripping the CDC of COVID-19 data is obvious, but still terrifying. — Sarah Midkiff
Masked, gloved, hood up, I’m eating takeout.
They don’t have to tell us the true numbers.
Coyotes and quail are taking back the streets.
The President says he’s doing great.
They don’t have to tell us the true numbers.
We have an Arizona Department of Economic Security
but the link is down. The President is doing great
as I search for rice and milk and toilet paper.
We have an Arizona Department of Economic Security,
I’m on hold. I pass a lady On the Trump Train
as I search for rice and milk and toilet paper.
She packs a .45 at Sprout’s, no mask, takes the last
Sola Bee Honey, the shirt On the Trump Train
made in China. Like the flash bang grenades
they threw at the Phoenix Free-Speech Zone last
night, the police tape at Surprise Park sparkles
in the sunlight. Just like China, flash grenades
were thrown at us in a Free-Speech zone,
a loud bang, smoke and in the middle sparks.
My mother has been coughing for a week.
Surprise Park has police tape, the kids play zone
closed. Maricopa Public Health is not at their desk.
My mother has been coughing for a week,
the homeless camp on Jefferson is empty.
Maricopa Public Health is away from our desk.
A masked deli man at Albertsons tells me,
the homeless camp on Jefferson is empty,
and the apartments on Grant and 7th burn.
The masked deli man at Albertsons tells me,
I do see a decrease here in the old and sick.
On television, the apartments at Grant and 7th burn,
and Arrowhead Towne Mall has a rabbit nest.
I too see a decrease in the old and sick.
Banner Hospital says they will call me back.
High at the vacant mall lot, I watch a rabbit nest.
Lindsey Graham worries that I won’t work.
Banner’s mobile testing unit will call me back,
coyotes and quail have taken back the streets,
Graham feels I’m disincentived to work,
they don’t have to tell us the true numbers.
Coyotes and quail have taken back the streets.
The President says he’s doing great.
They don’t have to tell us the true numbers.
They don’t have to tell us the true numbers.
