The Distance

by Dale Wisely

this poem for the pandemic dead is revised and reposted
as the numbers of lost Americans climbs

updated: 10/19/2020:

220,000 Americans dead (Johns Hopkins University). 

Another dream
of the dead–
Have you had this one?

They are
marching
single file, 
six feet apart.
they wear

masks and
keep that distance
to mock the failures
of the living.

I see the first
of the dead
at the head of the line
as they march
against traffic
on my side of the road,
consigned to the dusty shoulder.

He hails me stiffly
with a slow lift of his arm–
IV tubing trailing in the dust.
They march as I drive.
One by one. By one. By one.

I see the last in line.
But another appears
another another another.

Thousands, thousands of thousands
March march march
I drive and drive and drive
Two hundred ninety miles.

From the St. Louis Arch
to Graceland.

Or across the desert from
Las Vegas to Los Angeles

From Grand Junction, Colorado
to the Great Salt Lake

Chicago to Cincinnati

New Haven, Connecticut
to the District of Columbia

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 © 2020 by Dale Wisely: Creative Commons — Attribution 4.0 International — CC BY 4.0