Sunday, March 15, 2020

WHAT I LEARNED FROM THE CORONAVIRUS

by Pepper Trail




We never stop touching
                                             the face
                                                             of Earth

Every breath is taken back
                                                   in
                                                         by another

We are all infected
                                     by the world

There is no place to go
                                          away

These hard lessons
                                      and good


Pepper Trail is a poet and naturalist based in Ashland, Oregon. His poetry has appeared in Rattle, Atlanta Review, Spillway, Kyoto Journal, Cascadia Review, and other publications, and has been nominated for Pushcart and Best of the Net awards. His collection Cascade-Siskiyou was a finalist for the 2016 Oregon Book Award in Poetry.