The poetry of quarantine

“I hope the reader notices all the small blessings that we often overlook.”

Have you written poetry before? Has this experience encouraged you to write more poems?

I have been writing poetry since middle school, but recently suffered a bit of writer’s block. Writing “Balance” gave me a burst of inspiration and the push I needed to get back into the flow of writing.

In a line or two, tell us what inspired your poem. What message would you like the reader to come away with after reading your poem?

This poem is about gratitude. Gratitude for the health of my family, the food we have on our plates, and the privilege of being bored in my house. I hope the reader notices all the small blessings that we often overlook, things like a sunny window and a bowl of fruit.

How has living through the pandemic changed you? Do you think it has changed the way you think about college or career plans?

As I continue to live through this pandemic, I notice that I am becoming a more mindful person. I have started to slow down and prioritize things that I enjoy, instead of just going through the motions of life.

Do you have a favorite poet or author? What books are you reading, and what movies and documentaries are you watching?

I read too much to just pick one, but some of my all-time favorites include Mary Oliver, Sylvia Plath, Langston Hughes, and Haruki Murakami. I am currently reading Suzanne Collins’ newest addition to the Hunger Games series, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, and am very much enjoying it.

Two months balancing doomsday and domesticity.
I wonder if the soft bowl of my stomach will know hunger; if each piece of fresh fruit is
something I need to savor longer; if each easy breath is my last.
We now see that all that is not important falls away so quickly.
I look around to see what is left in the absence of pressure, in a void without school or the
denseness of people.
I see the bowl with too many tangerines,
I taste the garlic that seasoned that afternoon’s lunch.
Maybe these are the only things that will persist.
This and fruit cocktail and my aching joints; vienna sausage and my sinuses;
tangerines and the echo of my dry cough…
All I want to do anymore is feel. Live outside the liminal space of my body.
To be adrift and be okay;
to be intangible and love it;
to bear history’s gaze and feel fine;
to turn uncertainty into gratitude and make that enough.
Someday someone will ask me about this
I will just sob and I will lie
prostrate on the ground, kiss God’s land.
I will cry with thanks, I had so much;
my stomach never hungry;
a place to sun myself;
because for us, doomsday never came.

“I wondered if, in a world without answers, forgetting is our only option.”

Have you written poetry before? Has this experience encouraged you to write more poems?

Poetry has been an outlet for me to explore and express my thoughts and feelings. I think many people still view poetry as an endearing pastime rather than a significant endeavor, which makes competitions like this even more important. It was so rewarding and exciting to see my poem online and to receive recognition for such a personal creation. It has inspired me to write even more and reflect further on these unprecedented times.

In a line or two, tell us what inspired your poem. What message would you like the reader to come away with after reading your poem?

As each day of online school passed, I realized that, in addition to learning calculus and economics, I was learning new routines, studying new methods of living, memorizing a life without human contact. On test days, it was imperative to not forget, but as the death toll rose, that was all I wanted to do — to erase this page from my memory, to tear it from a textbook not yet written — and I wondered if, in a world without answers, forgetting is our only option.

How has living through the pandemic changed you? Do you think it has changed the way you think about college or career plans?

Before the outbreak of COVID-19, I often took for granted my walks to class and casual conversations with friends, but I’ve realized that these quiet actions hold the most beauty. But the pandemic isn’t alone in its precipitation of change and increased awareness. Protests around the country have shed a light on the changes needed in our law enforcement and legal systems and have strengthened my interest in studying criminal justice.

Do you have a favorite poet or author? What books are you reading, and what movies and documentaries are you watching?

While I don’t have a favorite author, I’ve fallen in love with the fantastic short stories of Jorge Luis Borges and Clarice Lispector. I am currently cherishing La Hora de la Estrella. I recently watched the documentary 13th to understand the larger context surrounding the BLM movement and the protests across the country, as well as the film Bacurau, which similarly investigates issues of racial injustice.

And what if I don’t write? What if months pass and I inject the pen’s ink into my thigh
rather than the paper? Will I forget how to speak? How to sing? How to grab my agony
from my abdomen and pull it up through my throat? Will I forget how it felt, sitting and
waiting and refreshing my snap, refreshing my memory?
We forget so quickly.
And what if I refuse to speak? Burn my right cheek at every meal. What if I forget to join
the Zoom calls? What if I learn a language no one else knows? You see, I am afraid of
learning. Afraid I’ll mistake my phone’s glow for a 3 a.m. sunrise, that I’ll slip into the
crevice in my mattress and never want to leave.
It’s been nine weeks.
And I’ve read. And I’ve watched. And I’ve journaled, and I am tired of pretending this will
just magically end. Tired of pretending this won’t change everything.
Because the thing is, I don’t want to leave. And that’s what hurts the most.
So what if I don’t? What if nobody does? What if we rip these pages from our calendars
and erase them from our memories? What if we burn the poems and newspapers, delete
the blog posts and tweets? The creases on nurses’ cheeks will soften. Their bloody noses
will scab over. The lines will decrease. And we’ll forget.
We always forget.

“The piece is a cry for help to our current system.”

Have you written poetry before? Has this experience encouraged you to write more poems?

I have written poetry before, having been published more than three times now. But the Florida Humanities contest… encouraged me to analyze my surroundings through a theme. The theme of how COVID-19 has shaped us helped me acknowledge certain realities about the disease, and especially how it has affected our government and our people’s manner of life. Following my experience, I am able to approach governmental, economic, and racial issues better within my writing.

What inspired your poem? What message would you like the reader to come away with after reading your poem?

“Thief” was inspired by the reactionary processes and policies during this pandemic, which prematurely opened businesses. I portrayed the pandemic as a strong woman who has power over the men and women of America. The piece is a cry for help to our current system that has allowed citizens to fully open businesses, provoking monumental death tolls in America. While the sweep of COVID-19 has taken with it the remains of our economy, the true ‘thief’ in the poem is our policies which have so willingly allowed the American public to be maskless and open our businesses in many places. The message of the poem is to reel in and comprehend our priorities. Americans are entitled to their own lives and, frankly their own faces, whether masked or not. However, without a mask, we also become entitled to the lives of our children, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles, and grandparents and their health. Much like the strong woman that corona personified in my poem, we should bend to the pandemic’s will; this is adaptation. This is preservation.

How has living through the pandemic changed you? Has it changed the way you think about college or career plans?

The pandemic has been an era of creativity for me. I have been writing frequently and interning for an anthology. Other activities include tutoring and Pilates, my new favorite form of physical activity. While the pandemic has brought the notion that nothing is a guarantee, I have sought comfort in my family. I have been taking college information sessions and tours, despite the fact we may not be going back to school. There was a point of realization during the seminars that colleges and careers will try to adapt to our current situation. There is a dichotomy between freedom and helplessness, though. While we are free from some obligations that may have appeared on our college applications, how can we set ourselves apart in this helpless time? With the removal of extracurriculars and some obligations of school comes the removal of motivation to wake up, but perhaps the “corona-cation” has given us time to reflect upon what we truly love to do most. For me, this is my writing.

Do you have a favorite poet or author? What books are you reading, and what movies and documentaries are you watching?

Currently, my favorite poets are Margaret Atwood, William Butler Yeats, and Emily Dickinson, who nearly inspired me to title all my poems as numbers. I have also been reading some Julia Alvarez, How the García Girls Lost Their Accents, the fiction/nearly nonfiction story of Alvarez herself. I love the story about the immigration of the Garcia family, because it relates so closely to my parents’ immigration story (my family comes from Turkey). I have also been reading Spanish books to increase fluency in the language. My family and I have watched almost every Oscar-winning film in quarantine —including Ford v. Ferrari and BlacKkKlansmen, which has become my favorite movie.

Stop whispering it, like it’s the only language you know…That’s it, say it
Oh, she is on the mouth of every politician and alcoholic “Economy plunger”, “Nation killer”
They call her, I guess they couldn’t handle a woman wearing nothing but her bearings
She’s a red lipstick kind of woman, a brown hair blue eyes type of killer
She made Mr. Brown quit his job and laid Mr. Turney in the hospital
Oh! the news is compiled of narcissists who make a living off her, but do not ever let her hear you say
that she’s doing it for the money. She’s swiped plenty of it from the pockets of restaurant owners,
that lady in the rundown strip mall with her own nail business, hell, she’s even got some of the doctors
begging for their pensions. Born with the fire of a criminal who has just been released from prison
and the rage of a prosecution attorney when he is silenced by the judge
Her womb is the parent of the technology and her hands are the enraged politicians that please it
She has a soft spot for them, right above her right ear I imagine
For what is an enraged politician who can’t whisper dirty lies about the condition of their government?
She sings her siren song to them and business owners and women scarred from domestic violence
And men who wish to spend their money on something other than canned soup and women
Come on say it… she’s on your mouth and my mouth, but neither of us have kissed her
That seductress, that job bandit, mask covering her mouth and nose, but not her pungent eyes
God, she’s so good at the game that she’s got everyone wearing masks,
In on the thievery of America for we are the nation’s thieves
Our new normal is protests along strip malls begging to strip the nation of its people
Virtual marches on the grass of high school campuses because prom
Ceased to placate the rising anger of desperate senior classes
Quarantine catfishing and quarrying for reason to go outside without masks because we thought
That being naked, transparent almost, with our government would please them
Little did we know that they were making love to the devil