Our Deliverance Rest In-Herd Immunity Poem by Mark Heathcote

Have you ever felt more naked than this?
Stripped down to the waist or further still
Wondering why Covid19 is our crucifix:
Trusting no one as a loving kiss could kill.
Have you ever felt more uncertain than this?
'What's the future hold', do we even have one?
So many questions - feels like the apocalypse-
Of-mankind has in earnest now begun.

Our lives on a saline drip enter an abyss.
Blame and recriminations are everywhere;
Neither side is willing to work together or forgive.
Conspiracy theories abound, so I despair
As help and medicines to Iran, are rejected.
Entire existences, sinking like battleships
Hard fought for lives drowning, newly infected
The culprit of which is flora spread by fingertips.

Have you ever felt more alone or disaffected?
On an empty bus, travelling home alone
Have you cross-examined or introspected
How many deaths we might be able to condone?
Our deliverance rests in herd immunity,
It's been, widely spoken of as the answer.
Isn't that why schools stayed open truthfully?
So that business doesn't—for too long, languor.

Our children are the carriers don't you know,
Villains of the peace dually sent home
In isolation, the government's politico;
Do as you're told or gurgle in your blood in baritone.
There's no escaping the grip of this disease,
No aspect of life, not drastically altered.
When armed robbery, is but a common-sneeze
It's then one and all, old veterans are slaughtered.

Even doctors and nurses are cannon fodder
With shortages of PPE some improvise
By tying plastic aprons around their head
But they're not fighting the German Luftwaffe
It isn't influenza they're-taking-on overhead.
They have courage rarely seen that exemplifies
What it means to fight for Queen and country,
And not be defeated by killers unheard or unseen.