Poetry/ Nightmares

The Little Ones Who Couldn’t Breathe

They still wake up screaming

Drawing by Lily during COVID times

I have forgotten

because the human mind is like this- it forgets

until art reminds it of what

shouldn’t have been.

When the pandemic turned into history, I searched through the web

for Covid art and I saw

oil paintings of faithful doctors,

terrified humans with distorted faces surrounded by

clouds of poison.

I saw

many

dark abstracts that could have been related to the Black Death

in Medieval times.

I passed through all of them with indifference.

They couldn’t throw me back into the nightmare

the way

my child’s old paper drawing

reminded me of all the little ones who couldn’t breathe.

This poem was written for the Catharsis Chronicles Competition. Thank you,

Chrysa Stergiou

!

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