Today is Matin’s Birthday!

Isolation and sequestering are the unsavoury by-products of the pandemic years. Matin’s birthday becomes symbolic of the forced separation from dear ones, experienced by a troubled world.

you say. 13?

                                    My, how he has grown since the pandemic swept in.

I wish we could see him,

                                    Visit him, hug him, tell him I love him.

Everything has change.

                                    I remember holding him, he was weeks old

I remember feeding him apple sauce, pushing his stroller so he could see trees,

                                    So he wouldn’t be inside all day staring at his mother’s back.

I remember holding his hand and walking by houses to kindergarten,

                                    I taught him to count, to know colors, the alphabet,

                                                To enter the covered slide alone

                                                            And I would wait at the bottom to catch him.

He was naturally well behaved, (except for those terrible twos),

            I taught him how to box, defend himself physically and verbally,

                        How to talk to girls.

I see his face on video calls,

            He says he is OK, but his face says DEPRESSION:

The war has changed everything.