By Chudi Okoye

I wonder what they see!

I wonder if there are Cosmic Beings with Elysian seeing
Peering at the batch on this lonely patch called Earth
Who watch as we hatch a response to match
A microscopic assailant trying to snatch our lives.

I wonder what they see.

I wonder what they think
If at all they have mental click.

Are they peering and jeering, mocking us
Clucking, as our fervid fear of Corvid-19 heightens?

Are they blocking us
Locking out any hint of breakthrough
If they have such power?

Or will they shower with blessing
Our hours of stressing and guessing
If they have such power?

Do they marvel that we won’t unravel
But have gaveled ourselves into action;
That we – a mutable race in an inscrutable space –
Have risen to the challenge of the corona savage
And are going after the virus with zeal that’s pious?

We are confronting this viral villain
With science and defiance
With songs from our lungs
With prayers and antiseptic slayers
With poetry and a clattery of incantations
Even with intestinal mockery
Despite our stuttering lamentations
And our tottering trepidations.

Facing a virus with alluring imagery but utter savagery
We humans are showing fearful bravery
Rejecting slavery to an enemy too tricky and too sneaky
To show itself except in microscopic manifestation.

Cheers to us humans
Wailing and flailing
But even in our failing
Still able to play as we seek to slay
This enemy assailing our lives, unseen
A stranger now grown into a full-blown danger.

Cheers to us humans
On our own in a forgotten planet –
First begotten as a celestial target, a magnet for varied assailants –
But determined to dominate this precarious habitation
With or without the munificence of the gods.

Hurray to us humans!

▲ Audio version of Hurray to Humans

March 27, 2020