By Rachel Baum
PROMPT—During Covid-19 ...
Another physicians assistant laptop
The doctor is MIA because you
Are not (ever) sick enough
Pull tight around you your 65 year old
White woman hospital gown of invisibility
Recite the wasted time fillers
Weight height blood pressure pulse
Review your meds are you safe at home?
Then do nothing there is nothing to do
You are nothing you and your
Unknowable phantom illness
Cancel the skeptical air the bored ceiling
Void the defensive dismissive clinic
Take this fusion of ache and bone
This corroded pipeline of fatigue
Leaking shards of electrical filament
Form elusive words that clamor and scream
Without sound from outside the elevator
That everyone uses and the only one to climb
Down the indifferent cellar stairs
Is you.
Rachel R. Baum is a professional dog trainer, former librarian, kayak angler, and Covid Long Hauler. She writes the blog BARK! Confessions of a Dog Trainer and is the editor of Funeral and Memorial Service Readings Poems and Tributes (McFarland, 1999). Her poetry has appeared in Wingless Dreamer, Poetica Review, New England Monthly Poetry Digest, and others.