Timelines II
by Siri Paulson in that other timeline the one that made some kind of narrative sense the one we could all agree was real we got our dual shots and it was over a year and a half after it began the world resumed better than before because we learned what the universe wanted us to know in the timeline that existed in a just world the vaccines came first to the most vulnerable countries, neighbourhoods, individuals who could least afford the high price of getting sick and inequities were levelled out instead of being piled higher in the timeline that never went sideways the one that even now we can’t believe we won’t see again we still breathed on each other and moved in crowds without a second thought we never knew the fear that burrowed into the bronchioles of our lungs the invisible six-foot spheres that followed us everywhere so what then do we call this timeline we’re stuck in now a Groundhog Day of wave after wave a sea that threatens to take our breath? if we can’t undo the last two years if we can’t step sideways and disappear into another part of the multiverse where will we go from here? what is the after and how will we know when we’ve reached it?