What Rough Beast Standard Edition | Poem for April 22, 2020

Bernadette McComish
Quarantine

They thought I was crazy, who
sent you the gas mask, who told you
to stock up for a month’s worth of food and water…

It was anthrax, then H1N1, and always
the rain.

All the missed
holiday dinners, justified. All the times
I looked up from the stage to find
an empty seat—
explained. She has lain in bed since
I was five. I remember wanting
to be in bed too, not to go
anywhere. Forever. But then,
I’d want to get up, get out, go
to the mall, ride my bike, rehearse
You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown.
And if it snowed, no.
If my forehead were hot, no.
If she didn’t want to drive or had her period, no.
No was her life, the bed her boat in a sea of not today
and maybe tomorrow. No pants

her fear of outside, a beast
she hid from, a monster she chose not
to battle. Locked herself in the basement
apartment, a cave for the hero she dreamed
would emerge from her nightgown once
flu season is over,
once it warms up outside,
once she had the right armor.

No matter how many Home Shopping
shirts she bought, some still in packages,
nothing ever seemed to soft enough
for her thin skin. As years passed
and the excuses and horrors became easier to stream
the once brave artist within withered,
fed by a new god of technology
and an endless supply of Costco croissants
and chocolate pudding to keep her from ever
leaving the house. The crypt
where I grew up. The home I escaped.

Bernadette McComish is the author of the poetry chapbook The Book of Johns (Dancing Girl Press, 2018).  Her poems have appeared in The Los Angeles Press, Storyscape, Reality Beach, Flypaper Magazine, Waxing and Waning, and Peregrine. McComish was a finalist for the New Millennium Award for poetry. She teaches High School in Los Angeles, and is a production coordinator for The Poetry Society of New York. McComish holds an MFA in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College, and an MA from Hunter College in teaching English as a second language.

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