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In the Streets

from Here to Stay by Anthony Tao, Liane Halton

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lyrics

The viruses had first and last names
until there were too many to count.
We grafted masks onto their faces

and by that point, what did names
matter? We locked them in boxes
sealed within larger boxes

built in ten days, but still
they leaked out into the streets,
bumping randomly into people

who could not see. Watch for them,
we whispered, but to us they all looked
the same. We practiced saying plague,

a fun word, not knowing the other ways
we are doomed. We stalked the side alleys
with déjà vu, feeling we’d done this

before, back in another lifetime—spying
on neighbors, reporting family,
misery enforced as baseline.

In a way, we are all the same disease.
To survive humans, you have to give up
humanity—so says the tyrant within.

Our lungs cracked like sheet ice. Breath
whistled through our veins like steam. We searched
for sickness, but there was only sharpness, like guilt.

credits

from Here to Stay, released May 22, 2020

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Anthony Tao, Liane Halton Beijing, China

LIANE HALTON graduated from Rhodes University in South Africa in classical guitar performance and composition. ANTHONY TAO is an editor and writer whose poetry has appeared in publications such as Prairie Schooner, Borderlands, The Cortland Review, Kartika Review, Frontier, Asian Cha, etc. ... more

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