Dear Vaccine

Dear Vaccine

#1

Dear vaccine,

please give them

a moment of rest,

prop them up

so they don’t

collapse on hospital

floors out of sheer

exhaustion.

Fortify their tired

and broken hearts,

after months of holding

phones over corpses

as their loved ones

wail on video

calls and say

their last

goodbyes.

Be their shield,

their sword

as they fight

for us

another

day.

#2

Dear vaccine,

I miss my father’s

bear hugs and the

countless little things

I had no idea I had

lost

a small table

for five (with no

acrylic partitions)

where we could

talk from brunch

to dinner, no

masks

the airport and

its rows of

crowded departure

seats

faces of people

on the

streets

crowds in

general

the massed

energy of our

collective

breaths.

Take us to

those places

again

one

day.

May 2, 2021

After Naomi Shihab Nye’s Dear Vaccine

Image from: https://www.globalvaccinepoem.com/ 

Post-Apocalyptic Strawberry Shortcake

Post-Apocalyptic Strawberry Shortcake

The things we will

miss the most: coffee

brewing, dinner dates

at our favorite

cafe,

newly baked

strawberry short-

cake still waiting

to be served, jazz

playing in the garden,

fairy lights

strung across

a tent,

our friends

and family,

well and

at home.

Who knows

what it will be:

a meteor, a variation

of this very pandemic,

the sun burning

too close, or

the tides rising

too fast.

Already, two

years ago

feels like a

decade.

What sweetness

there is left,

I’ll take

it.

Image: Mine (strawberry shortcake at Cafe Ysabel)

April 24, 2021

#NaPoWriMo2021 No. 24

Box

 

Box

Last week, I folded

away my trousers

indefinitely.

The most exciting

visit this week

was from a

courier.

Wakes and birthdays

are all onscreen now,

precious cargo

all partitioned

in squares,

sometimes black

with their initials,

mostly

muted.

I thought

it was interesting

to be in a cohort

that existed

before the

Internet.

But there

are other

labels now

that I don’t

want my

children

to have.

I seal them

in with me,

nevertheless,

to keep them

safe.

Image: brandable box on Unsplash

April 7, 2021

#NaPoWriMo2021 no. 7

The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A comfort to me during the pandemic

The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Real Life by James Martin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A comfort to me during the pandemic

I got this book as a gift a long time ago, around 2017. I only read one chapter during a difficult time in 2018. However, I started re-reading this book when quarantine started in March of 2020. It was a great companion to me during such a challenging time. Some tears were shed as I went through the chapters. However, the chapter that still resonated with me the most Chapter 13: Be Who You Is! since it was about vocation. "God desires for you to become who you are meant to be." The Salt Doll parable at the end of the chapter still moved me the same way it moved me in 2018. "Now I know what I am." This line also struck me: “In Ignatian spirituality nothing is hidden away; everything can be opened up as a way of finding God. ‘God must be found in everything,’ as Nadal noted, summarizing Ignatius.” I wrote this in my journal, in response, last June 26: "With each student and task, I touch God's face." These are such difficult times but this book reminded me to look beyond the immediate suffering and see the eternal in each moment that I encounter.

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