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Global Haiku • Millikin University • Spring 2020

COVID 19 Haiku

your alarm is set
wait 
i don't need this

Paige Boomer

undergrad 
done
now what is next

Paige Boomer

sprawled out 
on my bed
guess I'll work from "home"

quarantine,
all the days
blending together

walk to work
I put on my mask
hoping it covers fear on my face

a crowd in the store
quickly separated
by one sneeze . . .

Ashley Christensen

buzz cut
the one style
her mother knows

Shania Dvorak

lights low
family movie night
again

shifting the furniture
she rearranges
her life . . . again

Shania Dvorak

grocery shopping
from the aisle next to me
a cough

Kevin Escobar

front porch
a little taste
of the outside world

Kevin Escobar

we leave campus
unable to hug
an incomplete goodbye

bottle coveted
in a paper bag
hand sanitizer

not a human in sight
the trees feel free
to dance

Niki Curatti

lilac floats through the air
i think of you
how you like them too

Niki Curatti

graduation
I cross the threshold
of my bedroom

Dalton Glasco

stop!
don’t step there
this is my Covid square

zoom
the cars fly by
online classes outside

slowly but surely
the distance between us
shrinking

Grace Newton

running out of seasons
on Netflix
and emotions

is it
groundhog day?
not as fun as it seemed

Grace Newton

ten people in
now switch . . .
funeral

Dalton Glasco

we hope
we wait
for normal life again

masked mouth
your eyes
tell a story

Bre Johnson

service tip
delivering curb side pick
handing a bag through a car window

it can’t survive extreme heat
I heard . . .
who knows what to believe anymore

trapped
invisible bars
I’ve done nothing

Hannah Watts

work
they scan my forehead
98.3 . . . all clear

Hannah Watts

blue gloves,
blue mask,
goggles hug me

I never realized
how much I value
being able to leave

the coronavirus . . .
quiet walk
and no traffic

wishing the word
“pandemic”
meant something else

Taylor Parola

after lunch
I smell the barbeque
under my mask

Jared Chapman

going tanning—
we take our chairs
to the backyard

Jared Chapman

no shoes
no shirt . . .
no mask, no service

stuck in the house
gaining weight
not money

zooming everywhere
except for in
the car

sunburnt cheek
through the window
of my car

Jared Chapman

social distancing
but
people are still dying from a distance.

Jada Miller

another day
staring through the unwashed window
the border between us

Lysol—
everywhere
but Walmart

May 1
oops
here we go again

from afar
a wave
appears as a hug

Bre Johnson

it’s been two months
I ask
if I can hug you

Niki Curatti

her mask
freckled with bumble bees.
understudy for a smile

Niki Curatti

social distancing
I can’t do it
alone

Kevin Escobar

masking her expression—
green cotton
and dasies

Morgan Timmons

bare room
bare house—
tears drops on the wood floor

making my bed
washing my face—
a routine for quarantine

breaking the rules . . . my mom squeezes me tight

Morgan Timmons

the sun kisses her awake
another day
inside

Shania Dvorak

April turns to July 
wondering
how long will this last 

moving in
with my best friends
too good to be true

fresh out of college
not where 
I thought I'd be

Olivia Tharpe

ending school
I wonder how
summer is going to end!

quarantine
a line of ants
on my door

Pascaline Muhindagiga

in the school yard
alone a tree
Covid-19

collar and leash
I walk my dog
this is getting old . . .

I wake up
heart beating
it wasn’t a bad dream

I sit outside
to people watch
no one in sight

Erika Castanon

© 2020, Randy Brooks • Millikin University
All rights returned to authors upon publication.