Amanda White
Pharmacopoeia
Mental pandemonium in a prescribed capsule,
a bittersweet pill of house, offspring and occasionally
Father comprising the isolated wide world.
Mandated holding cell with the hot
breath of a Southern summer.
Crowds dispersed by fumigation,
like insects inhabiting a suburban lawn.
Poison seeps from woodland flora,
enforcing a lockdown also on the isolated copse.
Cocktails of Appalachian aloe and distilled ethanol.
Humidity creates adhesive facial coverings
worn religiously during essential excursions.
Townspeople with present-day pitchforks
prod at the faithless mask that
second amendment prayers will not remedy.
Conversations become conversion campaigns.
Friends who were once family have now transfigured,
forcing interventions of fewer than six feet.
Evangelizing that the concealing of nose and mouth must equal
Liberal doses of relapsing.
Pray to party dictates or cover yourself.
The pharmaceuticals of a country United,
overdosing on Liberty.
—Submitted on 10/07/2020
Amanda White is a reader, writer, and traveler currently living in Nashville, Tenn., with her husband and three rogue boys. She has a master’s in literature focusing on poetry and folklore.
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