Touch

This pandemic has separated us all,
It has troubled us very much.
Yet this threatening disease has not been able
to keep us from getting in touch.

We are saved by modern technology
wrought by mankind over the years.
An arsenal of tools and weaponry
gives us hope in this hour of fear.

With mobile phones and computer hardware,
endless cables wired under the sea.
With wireless waves sent over the air,
sophisticated software, eyes cannot see.

"Keeping in touch" has now become
just sending a message from your place,
or receiving a call from a loved one at home,
appearing on video, chatting face-to-face.

You can read what is written, hear what is spoken,
and see who appears on-screen.
Friends and family are never forgotten,
over the mountains, they can still be seen.

Just the other night I got in touch
with grandchildren at home across the sea.
Little boy and baby girl, we missed so much,
I talked to them, they reacted with glee.

The little boy couldn't quite understand
why I had to appear on a screen.
He asked me with a gesture of his little hand,
why to his home I have not been.

The baby sister has not yet learnt to talk,
at the faces on the phone she would stare.
Wide-eyed, with baby steps she walked,
She tried to touch us, she thought we were there.

Reaching out with a pair of little baby hands,
she yearned for a touch from people she'd seen.
Almost knocking over, the phone from its stand,
only to touch a cold lifeless screen . . .

Touch
20200427 2345 hrs

#Poetry #PoetryByHarolde
#napowrimo #glopowrimo #mywriters
#covid19 #pandemic #lockdown