Bored To Death
How do we maintain our humanity in the face of worldwide panic? How do we stay close despite distance? How do we build bridges across island universes?
A few planes still sigh their last goodbyes
Before the eager birds take back the skies
And sirens howl in daylight gloom,
With cries that pierce our well-stocked rooms
As we while away our final hours
We’re to take our tea and humor black
In weak defense against the soft attack
And what news we glean of passing days
Of piling bodies, unmarked graves
As we grow fat and fearful in our towers
When crafting communes ‘cross island worlds,
Though the gum and glue and twine unfurls,
Remain we huddled — spaced safe apart —
With marked concern for lung and heart
And our suspicions surf the very breeze
Our gardens verdant still yet grow
And pay no heed to horror shows
The spring still sprung, the plants yet flowered
Immune against the silent power
That murders all with but a sneeze
And some still throw their heed upon a wind,
The very gale that brought the death of men,
And they revel ‘fore the flood and famine
Precious little have their thoughts examined
While we forfeit those we would embrace
Our covered mouths will sing our tune
In defiance of the winds of doom
While slow, slow, slow the sun to rise
And shine its light upon our enterprise
Of standing still in place —
In boarded tombs, bored to death,
Staggered are our final breaths
That place little faith in brain or brawn
To save us from this whispered dawn
That laid his claim upon our world.
Tim Royan is a writer and journalist from Los Angeles who is currently being cooked alive in Phoenix. His writing has appeared in Esthesis Magazine, The Arizona Republic, Tuscon Weekly and Arizona PBS. When he’s not trying to arrange words in a pleasing sequence, Tim is usually playing, writing, listening to or ranting about music. He is known to go on tangents.
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Cooked alive (lol!) I love the Phoenix heat. Moved here from Buffalo, NY over 20 years ago.
Enjoyed the poem always interesting to see how others handle isolation.
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Hello, this is a nicely explained article. Your piece was very informative. I had never heard the issue presented in that light. Thanks for your hard work.