I Was Once on a Quest

felt like I could ride any horse
and had destiny like a hound at my side.

Then I had a fall, and another, and another…
so much churning of hooves the whining of a dog…

and now I am alone in my profound uselessness

walking the labyrinth of my home town
in the snow trying to count every fleck on my eyelid
as a blessing because so many are dying

and I am alive in this pure rawness of being
in this body in which I have always been ill at home.

I wanted to live by the myths until this gormes became reality.

If only I’d studied science, medicine, rather than poetry
I might have been able to decipher the dragon’s
RNA – the pathogen’s genetic code.

But now I’m just one of the many told to stay at home.