The Black Breath

Streets grow empty, day by day
As silence fills the air.
Each stranger passing down the road
Is met with cautious stare.

Sirens wail throughout the night,
Foretelling grief ahead.
Each ringing phone may bring the news,
Another soul has fled.

We wear our masks on every street
As faces softly blend.
A simple handshake now is deemed
Too risky to extend.

Nurses and physicians work
Until the break of day.
Plexiglass replaces touch
As loved ones pass away.

Desperately we wait for word,
No soul can tell our fate.
The future fades into a fog
Too thick to penetrate.

If someday someone asks us where
This plague first drew its breath,
We’ll point across the ocean to
The land that summoned death.

If you would walk where this began,
Take spade to hallowed ground.
Then dig straight through toward Wuhan;
In we all shall bound.