by Jerome Betts
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| The UK is the first country in the world to start using the Pfizer vaccine after regulators approved its use last week. Second in line for the jab at University Hospital in Coventry was 81-year-old William Shakespeare from Warwickshire. —BBC, December 10, 2020 |
Virus malign, the clock is ticking,
Don’t try to dodge the needle’s pricking
That can end pandemic woes.
Spread no further, start retreating,
Journey’s end is Covid’s beating
Mr William Shakespeare knows.
Jerome Betts lives in Devon, England, and edits the verse quarterly Lighten Up On Line. His work has appeared in a wide variety of British magazines and anthologies as well as UK, European, and North American web publications such as Amsterdam Quarterly, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, The Asses of Parnassus, Better Than Starbucks, The Hypertexts, Light, The New Verse News, and Snakeskin.