by Tricia Knoll
You lament we’ve missed so much
theater, solstice estivals, state fair curly fries,
Aunt Moo’s 75th birthday at the river
but I’m thinking of what I don’t miss
yellow fever polio lockjaw
flu hepatitis diphtheria
because I learned a thing or two
from mumps measles chicken pox
whooping cough
see I’m old enough to have had those
but not the firsts because I got the shot
and I’m old enough to have had
my two COVID quick pricks
so I don’t miss holding my new grandson
on the way, seeing our plays unfold
on a stage with open curtains.
Amen and thank you.
Tricia Knoll just got her second COVID shot. She took the "quick pricks" from Naomi Shihab Nye's poem "Dear Vaccine." Knoll's new chapbook Checkered Mates is available from Kelsay Books and Amazon.