nick-kane-VZ1Gjc5MP-Y-unsplash copy
My Lockdown Mask
by Carolyn O’Connell

I’ve not walked through the woods with you
heard the chime of bluebells, or passed
the garden where the wooden dinosaur rises
over the young trees planted last year.

I’ve not had hugs from you or sat at your table
while you prepared dinner, your girls
winding a path of chatter through the house
as you juggle being teacher, mother, and daughter.

Enclosed like a vestal in some far temple:
a hostage in a blue mask to the Pandemic God;
as the sun wakens earlier each morning
and others congregate below my window
like the blackbirds chattering in the hedge.

My mask sits unworn for everything’s delivered
and I’m seen only on the video of my computer
it’s the window of my Anchorite’s cell
where friends appear seeking my words.

While you in a handmade mask travel to teach
to children who’d rather be at home –
though they’re teens they know they’ll never get an “A”
they don’t know the meaning of social distance
but you’ll support them as you’ve always done.

I’m waiting for the day I can walk with you again
when arm in arm we’ll walk beside the river
and look back upon these days when you
came to me, when we only spoke as I stood at the door.

There I can sometimes see your daughters,
who sit quietly on the far step I cannot cross
for you have taught them how to social distance.

Photo of a walk beside the river by Nick Kane on Unsplash

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: This poem is a reflection and conversation with my daughter on how it feels living in Lockdown and not having gone further than the front step since it began.

oconnell

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Carolyn O’Connell lived in London but now lives in Cheshire U.K. She has been published in Envoi, Reach, and other magazines, online and print, and in anthologies. Her debut collection Timelines was published by Indigo Dreams 2014. Her poems have been translated into Romanian via The University of Bucharest Translation Café/Poetrypf.com PoetryR/O project. Visit her blog, on Facebook, on Twitter, at Goodreads, and here.