Oh wicked magician,

Latest victim died at dawn,

For once she was there,

And next she was gone,

Oh wicked magician,

You perform on four stages,

The fourth being hopeless,

Death locked up in cages,

Oh wicked magician,

How beguiling your act,

Your tricks undetected,

Your surprise without tact,

Oh wicked magician,

How long is your show,

Two weeks, ten years,

Your intentions unknown,

Oh wicked magician,

What age is your unwilling volunteer,

Did he turn sixty seven,

Was she to turn three next year,

Oh wicked magician,

Your wand grants me no wishes,

Though it does make me dream,

I'd had time for more kisses,

Oh wicked magician,

We fight but you ruin that too,

Fighting is tethered to I.V. poles,

Told there's nothing we can do,

Oh wicked magician,

Up your sleeve lies a cure,

But you prefer martyr's,

Lined up at death's door,

Oh wicked magician,

Pickpocketing thief,

Stolen hair, lives, dreams,

Your pain bares all it's teeth,

Oh wicked magician,

Like your flowers, tumors grow,

Growing bills, growing saddness,

Growing to kill us, your foe,

Oh wicked magician,

I know one thing, your name,

Your name is Cancer,

No one wants you, but you came.

A red maple shaded the yard in front of our Victorian. There was one branch just low enough that a tall nine-year-old, leaping with an outstretched arm—or a six-year-old lifted by her father—could snatch a leaf to treasure for the duration of a walk, or occasionally press in a dictionary. It was tall. The deed indicates that builders made our fieldstone foundation in 1891, and I assume the maple had been planted around the same time. Dozens of seedlings appeared each spring. I always meant to transplant two or three to the back yard instead of mowing over them, but I didn’t, and now I can’t. There’s a stump, and my home is not my home anymore.

They desperately looked in all the wrong places, first. I mean after it decimated the hospital, because at the hospital they weren’t really looking for the cause. They only tried to treat a patient, and then it was too late for all of them. The bodies of a dozen doctors and nurses get an awful lot of attention, even more than the few dozen patients, because we assume the professionals can protect themselves. When they couldn’t, the CDC vans rolled into town, and we knew we were in trouble.

That dread was all we knew, that and what the evening news could say. “Mysterious lung ailment,” “unknown disease,” “killer plague.” Even within the quarantine, we got no information from the hazmat suits that roamed our streets. I do not blame them anymore because silence is better than a lie. Advanced degrees or not, when you know nothing, what can you say? They rounded up the usual suspects – rodents, birds, mosquitos, romaine lettuce – and found no origin. None of the initially presenting patients had left the county for six months, let alone the country, so it had to be endemic. Whatever corrupted our lungs, it came from here, and we demanded that they find it.

And they did. Some still blame them for the time the investigation took, unfairly. Who would have suspected fungus? They could not immediately recognize the spores in the tissue samples: the smallest previously-known spore had been 3 micrometers by 2 micrometers, so they did not know to look for 1X1. When they did find spores, they believed them incidental rather than the culprit because while pneumonia can stem from fungi, the rapidity with which the disease murdered the doctors and patients at Davenport Hospital screamed “contagion.” Fungal pneumonia was never contagious and rarely rapid, until now. Prior to this mutation, only the immunosuppressed were at risk. And, of course, fungal infections respond to antifungals.

Our plague responds to nothing.

Certainly, they could not have suspected it came from the trees. Healthy trees, of all species, with not a visible blemish on them, until you looked very closely at a limb, any limb, and saw the spots. Black. Myriad. Fecund.

So now the trees are gone. It was the only way. Mile after mile of pine and oak and birch, chopped and incinerated. They found fire kills the spores if it’s hot enough (cremation is mandatory), and it’s all they know to do, here and in the other places. Most of the contamination spread in-state, but there were also outbreaks across the border in Pennsylvania. A few poor souls drove spores to Kentucky when their kindergartner kept a hiking stick, which souvenir cost them their lives and everyone else Knobs State Forest.

There have been no outbreaks for ten months. We’ve all moved away, and I assume my family will be safe, miles and miles from our Victorian where, for all I know, the plates still wait at the dinner table. The hazmat suits who rushed us away ordered us to leave everything behind for fear of those micrometer by micrometer specks. They think they’ve destroyed them all, though of course the world will know soon enough. The spores would germinate in June.

Pie’s shoes had holes,

his toes stuck through,

this ragamuffin man

holding his musical pipe -

tra la la la!

Garments were multi colored -

he whirled his arms

and boasted of charms

and promised the mayor

to get rid of the rats -

rat-a-tat-tat

and that was that.

Bubonic plague

from diseased rodents

festered and spored,

was greatly abhorred.

Pie didn’t say much

as he led all the rats

out of town to the river

where they splashed

and drowned.

No one felt bad,

no one was sad,

in fact, they were glad

but miserly mayor

had nary a prayer

as he refused to pay

the pied piper.

The piper got even

as he led all the kids

out of town

never, ever

to be seen again.

But rumor had it,

he sold them

to slavery,

or led them all

to drown in the river –

save me, save me!

Or maybe, worst of all

he was a pedophile

with treacherous guile

who kept the kids

for his own use.

But there’s no excuse

for not paying this man

imagine if you can

that this is a true story -

just look skyward at

stained glass window -

memorial to children

while their spirits

flow lofty and high

and Pie lives on.

On a street, down the block, where the crow flies is a house with long old dusty curtains puddled onto the floor behind unyielding glass casements. The light struggles unsuccessfully to permeate the room competing with the stagnant air, both surviving in spite of the environmental hindrance beyond their control. She sits, alone and alive in the midst of it all, upon a worn recliner as if advanced aging was some prize to be won; with quarantine as her only saving grace, believing she is safe from what she knows lurks on the other side. Collectively and singularly she fears it is the Coronavirus lusting to write on the parchment of her death certificate. Coronavirus, the lethal label for the aged, she has heard, is spoken about from an open susceptible mouth reporting the bad news transmitting over the airwaves but in the end will not be her cause of death. When they finally remove her emaciated nutrient deprived body from the upholstery, and slide her into the body bag, she might have been happy to know she remained virus free until death. Cause of death, starvation, never even crossed her mind.

The pestilence,

a lack of light,

diseased each mind —

a darkened age;

the poor and weak,

consumed like blight,

where locusts ate

both pen and page.

Well-versed,

now mankind

drinks a swell;

death’s plague of black,

far from their thoughts.

In tainted waters

wise men sell,

their knowledge spreads;

the scourge is caught.

Is this the end for us all?

Why did the group create such a catastrophe?

They had a so~called vision!

To bring humanity to a much greater height,

but now it’s just a disaster—

Humans have surely changed- -

One whiff of the toxic substance in the air~

& wham—- their cells mutate into varying forms of something that is no longer human..

There is no vaccine, or cure for anyone who turns into these human mutants/scary beings.

So—my main task ever since the problem started—is to try to take these things out...before they outnumber the somewhat healthy humans left on the planet.

#PANDÉMIE!

I held onto her pale white hand,

rubbing my thumb over the purple marks on her skin,

not caring if the disease would transfer to me

Although, I wish it would

I want to see those purple dots crawl up my arms and legs

Cover my eyes and whisper in my ears,

¨You wear the mark of death.¨

I want to see her skin turn the color of peaches in spring

I want her lips to become as red as coral

I want her eyes to wander about the room with curiosity

I want to feel the warmth of her hand as she squeezes me tight

I want to smile and tell her that I will see her in just a little while

I want to lie and tell her that she will live

Although, half of what I said would be true

I would see her again

She would come out in that same stretcher once more

Only this time,

Covered by a white-blanketed death

The countless parade

towards mourn 's hail

One over the another

stuffed in numbers

on graveyard's land.

Shrieking in the void

full of hollow entrails,

running hither tither

Diseased with hollow bones.

Those hands with thief's deed

but heart of a mere child

pleading to cure their own needs.

The virus dancing in the mist

Inviting humans to their mysterious

lyrics.

Bed stricken, lost lives

So much tears brimmed in our eyes.

Medicines garnished

with fruits rich in vitamins,

and grains full of lavish;

Served to those with fields

Of coins growing in dehisce.

Oh did you see!

Those crowned with virus are getting their needs.

Not all,

but the concern has leaped

to limit its reach.

Humans are selfish

Selfish enough to design

Every cure to protect this world from corona's sins

where those poor lurking on the streets

licking the bins,

spreading their hands just to calm their bellies.

Oh how sick we are;

Sick enough to not stand up against this filth.

Oh please spare the agony—

Spear the righteous trends.

Bow down to the air you breathe.

Say goodbye to all your friends.

Say so long to all your enemies.

A fond farewell to lovers.

Maybe we could’ve beaten this,

If we’d learned how to treat each other.

If only neighbor had been neighborly,

And stranger had been friend;

We could’ve saved humanity

But instead we’re facing the end.

So much time was wasted and lost,

Looking at gender and wealth and skin.

If only we had realized the cost

Of dividing by land and religion.

It was hate that made us create it:

The virus in our labs.

We didn’t realize when we made it

That there’d be no taking it back.

We didn’t realize how fast it would spread,

And all the lives that it would take.

We finally see it now that everyone’s dead:

Epidemics don’t discriminate.

I can’t tell you how much it disgusts me to see a woman leave a bathroom without making use of soap and water. I cringe, biting my tongue, wanting desperately to scream didn’t your mother teach you to wash your hands after you go to the bathroom? But, clearly, she didn’t, so what is the point of insulting a stranger’s mother, incurring her (embarrassed) anger and suffering the wrath of a woman scorned?

But, in this day and age, at such a critical time in global history, you would think that we would be advanced enough to understand the importance of handwashing. Not because you peed on your hand, simply because you’ve been out in the world, touched unclean surfaces like door knobs and such and probably picked up a germ or two. Why not take the opportunity being in a bathroom offers and wash your hands? Seriously, you can’t take thirty seconds to possibly save a life? Perhaps, your own?

I mean, come on! The news is rife with the rapid spread of the virus, interfectorum manus. Social media is blowing up with news about the latest cases, the rising number of deaths. More people have died in the last week from interfectorum manus, than died all of last year of cancer, HIV and malaria combined! No one can figure out how to stop it from spreading. The only thing that has been made clear worldwide is that washing your hands helps. Apparently, soap and water can eliminate it from your hands. But, if the virus gets on your hands and you don’t wash them within four hours, by the fifth hour you might as well buy your coffin, you’ll be dead within a week, maybe two if you’re not lucky.

The pictures on Facebook, Instagram and even the evening news of the dying and deceased are horrific. Horror flick-like videos have been plastered on Vimeo, Dailymotion, Snapchat and YouTube. (Why?? I ask myself.) The stories are rampant of the agony people suffer as they watch their loved ones’ bodies shrivel and melt away. They are helpless, shocked...terrified and repulsed. So many have been left to die alone as people try to escape the possibility of contagion. Can you imagine being left alone to die, unable to do anything to help yourself? The first body part to wither away? The hands.

On a more positive note, the fact that the disease is not confined to developing countries, or the poor and marginalized in more developed countries has made its containment and eradication a number one priority for pharmaceutical companies who see a windfall in the making if their researchers can only find the cause and then a cure. Research for every other major disease (including cancer and HIV) has been paused so that all efforts can be focused on interfectorum manus. The most respected scientists in the world have been cloistered in labs across the globe to decrease their chances of succumbing to the disease before a cure can be found. They are working around the clock...as is interfectorum manus. Last year, approximately two million people total died of HIV, cancer and malaria. Fifteen million died of heart disease. According to every news source I read this morning, the death toll due to interfectorum manus has reached 50 million. The first case was reported six months ago.

People, please: Wash your hands!!