by Donald Mace Williams

I see more people every day
With little feed bags on.
How long, if such a fad holds sway,
Till all the oats are gone?

by Barbara Loots

The cat has a flapdoor for in-and-out going.
The gutters un-gummed keep the rainwater flowing.
The hinge that was squeaky?
The pipe that was leaky?
All fixed.
And that ratty old table? Antique-y!
The junk is hauled out
and the basement is clean.
A shim solves the shimmying
washing machine.
The driveway is sealed
from the house to the street.
The weeds in the grass
have gone down to defeat.
The porch swing is painted.
The sidewalk cemented.
The frenzied refurbishing?
Almost demented.
Have you been distraught, dear,
with nothing to do?
This buzzing and sawing
just isn’t like you!
Devotion by demo?
I don’t need the proof!
For godsake, my darling,
come down from the roof!

Steven Stampone

The school desks are empty, say teachers.
The pews will stay bare, say (most) preachers.
The stadium’s stands
Are lacking in fans,
But the ER is filling with bleachers.

by Julia Griffin

“Man busted in Spain for taking goldfish for a walk during lockdown”
—The New York Post

When énervé Nerval took out his lobster,
And Dali daily walked his ocelot,
Was either one arrested like a mobster
Or busted for it? Obviously not.

The moose of Tycho Brahe got to travel
Without arousing panic-stricken squeals,
And surely (watching out for scratchy gravel),
Licinius Muraena aired his eels.

My, how the world has altered! My idea
Was just to let my goldfish stretch his fins,
When suddenly here come the policía,
In plastic suits and masks from cheeks to chins.

A hefty fine and lengthy lecture later,
I’m locked back down, with fish and Google. Wait—
John Quincy Adams had an alligator:
A choice I’m starting to appreciate.

by Nina Parmenter

Here is the bat that coughed and sneezed,
here is a droplet on a breeze,
and here is the pangolin who breathed
and caught a bit of bother.

Here is a market in Wuhan,
and here is the germ that caught a man
who kissed his wife—and so began
a little bit of bother.

Here is a party man who guessed
that bad diseases breed bad press,
and here is the day he chose not to confess
to a little bit of bother.

Here is a leader across the sea,
here is his booming economy
and here are the dying he chose not to see
until they were a bother.

Here are the coffins and here are the casks,
here are the care workers begging for masks,
and here are the scientists facing the task
of sorting out the bother.

by Nora Jay

“The university town of Lund in Sweden is to dump a tonne of chicken manure in its central park in a bid to deter up to 30,000 residents from gathering there for traditional celebrations to mark Walpurgis Night on Thursday.”
—The Guardian

In scholarly Lund, there’s a whiff in the air
Of danger (and more, to be sure):
Are you up for spooks and a medical scare,
Or are you too chickenmanure?

—Punta del Este, Uruguay

by Catherine Chandler

A pride of lions lounges on a street
in Africa, while I sit here inside,
hobnobbing with my little parakeet.

She chatters as I Instagram and tweet.
We seem to take the quarantine in stride.
In Wales, as gangs of goats invade a street,

I FaceTime, bake, clean, sleep and overeat.
In gazing seaward from my glorified
Bastille, I doubt my little parakeet

is happy with her cage, her millet treat
and cuttlebone. I bet she’d rather ride
the wind. As Thai macaques dash down a street

Jumanji-esque, and screaming peacocks meet
in empty squares in Ronda, Spain, I bide
my time. At least my little parakeet,

free from this government-imposed retreat,
may leave. And though I never thought that I’d
release my little lime-green parakeet,
away she flies above Artigas street!

by Ruth S. Baker

I fear I have a covert case of COVID:
An incubus I find I can’t shake off.
My eyes, reflected in this screen, look mauvèd;
Each time I think about a cough, I cough.

My mind is just careening from Corona;
The markets of Wuhan seem very near,
And though I’m more sequestered than was Jonah,
I’ve somehow caught this awful thing—I fear.

by Bruce Bennett

“By mixing compounds from garlic, citrus and other additives into a pellet that’s mixed with a cow’s regular diet, the start-up [called Mootral] has surprised scientists by significantly and consistently cutting the toxic output of animals like Peaches [the cow].”
—The New York Times

Let’s hear it for Mootral. They’re onto a way
to cut down on methane. There may come a day
when Peaches won’t belch, and the world will be free
from gas that is noxious. From cows. Not from me.

by Julia Griffin
(sheltering in southeast Georgia)

I

“Gyms, hair salons, bowling alleys and tattoo parlors: Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp says
some shuttered businesses can reopen Friday … as long as owners follow strict
social-distancing and hygiene requirements.”
—The Chicago Tribune

This week, at last! Our jolly Georgia jokers
Have opened up the state. We say three cheers!
We’re free to be tattooed with 6-foot pokers,
Or get a trim from pristine garden shears.

II

I’m doing my best to preempt
Critiques of my styling attempt:
Though usually Georgia’s
The home of the gorgeous,
These days we are safer unKempt.

by Bruce Bennett

—after Dorothy Parker … and despite Donald J. Trump

Rays can cause cancer.
Bleach makes you sick.
Lysol’s the answer?
That kills you quick!
Hydroxychloroquine’s
fatal, like lye.
All ways, the virus wins.
Might as well die.

by Dan Campion

“I have instructed the United States Navy to shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea.”
—A tweet from President Donald J. Trump

Sir, be advised: no gunboats fly.
They’re darn hard to “shoot down.”
We could, I guess, aim for the sky,
Though gunner’s mates may frown;

They’re more accustomed, sir, to aim
Directly at their foe.
So please you, if it’s all the same,
At gunboats, we’ll shoot low.

by Philip Kitcher

Today the store is empty-ish, and everyone is masked.
We push our carts politely, and we step aside when asked.
Although the shelves are sparsely stocked, they now have flour at least
But no yeast.

The fish is plainly past its best, the dairy case is bare,
The produce is depleted—will we have to live on air?
Two boxes of spaghetti need to last three nights … or four …
Maybe more … ?

I’m starting to grow desperate, I’m almost out of time.
Perhaps I’ll make a pasta sauce from okra and a lime?
No garlic, no tomatoes—I find just one can of beans
And no greens.

Supplies are looking meager as I reach the liquor aisle
And there behold a vision sure to make a shopper smile.
I grab a case of red and then I join the checkout line.
We’ll be fine.

by Bruce Bennett

I used to only lose my gloves.
I now can’t find my mask.
Life’s pushes have turned into shoves.
I’m not up to the task

Of daily living in these days
of chaos and of strife.
It’s possible it’s just a phase,
but please! Don’t ask my wife.

by Alex Steelsmith

In 430 BC, Thucydides contracted and survived the Plague of Athens, which killed an estimated 75,000 to 100,000 people. According to Wikipedia, he “developed an understanding of human nature to explain behavior in such crises as plagues…” and “has been dubbed the father of ‘scientific history.’”

Wikidy sickedy
Father Thucydides
lived through, and wrote of, a
virus from hell,

though he was said to have
multimorbidities
and, scholars tell us, no
hoard of Purell.