St. Patrick’s Day 2020

“I believe in the love, it is all that we have.” — Scott Wannberg

It’s here,
the virus that eats old people,
and yesterday I hit 66.
Never thought this old flesh could be so appealing.
An uneasy contract for a body shy at heart.

Atlas reaches back, an itch he just has to scratch.
The sky falls.

Icarus flies into the sun on nitro bat wings.
Boom, goes the dynamite!
It’s a whole new game of
extraordinary innings.

New borders are being drawn around a state
of heightened emotions.

Everyone in their right or left mind
are emergency clowns painted in primary colors of
angry, afraid and sad.

The elevator to fight or flight
that has no stop button
moves swiftly,
as this swirling miasma of feelings
shifts into electric sleep on a new set of wheels.

Big moments get small in less than a New York minute,
a single week seems like years waiting for your ticket to ride.
We all hang suspended in our disbelief.

But there is still kindness in the world–
compassion, civility.
There is love.
Get it while you can,
save it on an empty shelf
somewhere in your heart.
Remember where you put it in case of emergency,
don’t be afraid to break the glass.

Here and there,
together and alone,
we have never been where we are going,
although it is guaranteed,
we will get there.

Time abides,
the earth abides,
people too.

So does the blushing heart
that rises with every sun
laughing in the clover.

S.A. Griffin / Photo by Mark Hanauer

S.A. Griffin. lives, loves and works in Los Angeles.