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Life in the Time of Corona
Post-Covid Paradise
Claire Massey
Claire Massey is Poet Laureate for Pensacola Pen Women. She served on the editorial board of the Emerald Coast Review in 2019. In 2020, she has work appearing or forthcoming in Persimmon Tree, The Avalon Literary Review, The Dead Mule, and Panoply.
Though I did admire the artistry
of costumed humanity, the sunny arc of beads
defying gravity,
the raucous throng of carnival,
the collective roar of Mardi Gras
was not my Shangri-la.
My idea of paradise was                 Â
an umbrella drink on an empty beach,                       Â
a day alone writing to my heart’s content,
a solo voyage on a Sunfish,
the thrill of distance diminishing
hails from a crowded shore.
Now, heaven would be a parade,
friends hugging,
strangers’ shoulders touching,
hands joining ‘round the same shiny throw,
then swiftly spreading
open-throated, open-handed
letting go.
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