Please Don't Leave Us Behind

Original art by Cara Morgan

Please Don’t Leave Us Behind

after “Community” by Grace Clements

by Cara Morgan

“Once you become disabled, death will be the figment chasing you every single day and everyone around you will root for it.” -Imani Barbarin
The data and the doctors told me to stay inside.I wash my hands, wear a mask, keep my distance.For myself, for each other. 3 years later I’m still a homebody.Still a dull body chained to my distrust of the world.No one cares anymore about keeping me safe.In the rush to return to normal,I am deemed an acceptable death.
When you’re sick enough for long enough everyone stops caring.
It will come for you too.Be it COVID or an accident or old age,there will come a day when your body betrays you.You will feel shame and terror and disgustand you’ll realize how much you hated me when you hate yourself instead.
You will hide in your home and the world will cheer at the loss of you.
Please don’t leave us behind.One day, however soon, you’ll be like me.Another dull body.Another acceptable death. 
The space you leave will fill like a fetid wound no one cares to clean. 

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Featured in our August 2023 issue, "Ekphrasis"