Looking over
the top of my mask
my glasses already steamed,
I meet your eyes, stranger,
and we smile.
We cannot see these smiles
but we know we are smiling.
The twinkle in the eye tells all.
We raise our hands in silent salute.
Nothing could have prepared us
for this moment, or maybe
everything did.
If only our hands could meet,
right here, we’d become a prayer.
We know we are members
of the same tribe,
fighting an insidious evil
that flourishes on the breath,
on the wind, and has run
unchecked in all the lies of now,
and in all the lies past.
Let it be unchecked no more.
In the journey towards justice,
there is just us, essential prophets
seeing beyond the mask.
Lisa Vihos has four chapbooks and her poems have appeared in numerous journals, both print and online. She is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee and the poetry and arts editor of Stoneboat Literary Journal. Just this past week, Vihos was named the poet laureate of Sheboygan, WI—the city's first—where she also serves as an organizer for 100 Thousand Poets for Change.