Day before the stay-at-home
order goes into effect,
I lace my ears, muzzle my mouth
in gauze. Each exhalation
steams my spectacles
blind. A postal worker shouts
at me for invading
the six feet required for the next
in line. I conceived of things
corporeal only, confesses
Augustine. Droplets of rain tingle
my uplifted face, the backs
of my hands, the cough that conducts
the virus to my airways.
I conceive of raindrops as mist, the virus
as a white noise machine, the dark
beehive Mom planted
in the hollow of the hallway
to drown out her bedroom counseling
sessions, working from home.
The sky drapes a staticky blanket
of needlepoints over my corporeal body,
pricks that hail a rush
of blood into the arm you fall asleep on.