Crossing the Pandemoticon
It began with a hand
clenched experimentally to ear
not so much a fist
as a makeshift mouthpiece
designed to broadcast miracles
speaking in tongues:
‘habari,kangarooshni,slapit
nego,nego,unulti possum!
craaghi covid ipsit cunnilingo ?
es krampit todo kwa heri ‘
a polyglot mother tongue
Nordic vowels, Slavic consonants
Swahili syntax, Latin verse
with just a touch of Lewis Carroll
to stitch into proper nonsense
all in the hope some passers by
might stop and listen,
become alarmed,
and call a passing drone
to guide me to a ’place of safety’
where the only voices heard
were broadcast in my head.
But all they see
is an elderly guy
clutching a smart phone
doing foreign dumb talk
into his high vis mask
to someone just like them
in Karachi , Prague or San Francisco
Once upon a time
before we crossed the pandemoticon
we lived in another country
where language was affordance enough .
One day , tuned to a secret station
on my very own pirate radio
I was talking to my imaginary friend
when suddenly she grabbed a fistful of vowels
and cartwheeled down the street
shouting oy , oy look, no hands….