Vox Populi
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Naomi Shihab Nye & Michael Simms: Writing Prompt # 6 | Dear Vaccine
Dear Virus, Dear Vaccine by Michael Simms You made us wise, well-acquainted with sorrow and with love because love is specific. I don’t love dogs or trees or children. I love this dog, this tree, this child – something I often forget to remember. As we enter our new lives will we remember the faster we moved the sicker we got? Will we remember not wearing our true faces?
Copyright 2021 Michael Simms
This poem was written in response to a prompt from Naomi Shihab Nye. Please add your lines to the poem being built on this website.
Dear Vaccine is a global community poem, inviting all to share their voices to promote COVID-19 vaccination through the imaginative language of poetry. The project is a collaboration between the Wick Poetry Center at Kent State University, housed in the College of Arts and Sciences & The University of Arizona Poetry Center, housed in the College of Humanities.
The Global Vaccine Poem project is inspired by Naomi Shihab Nye and her global advocacy for the power of poetry. Nye was named the Young People’s Poet Laureate by the Poetry Foundation in 2019.
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Thank you, Michael, for including the virus as well as the vaccine in your poem. The first brought lessons, the second a chance to apply them. And thanks for sharing Naomi Shihab Nye’s collective poem…I just added a stanza and love watching this beautiful monster grow! 😊
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‘It’s the beginning of the end, it’s a timid, sleep-logged sun just emerging from clouds. It’s not happily ever after, but “on your mark, get ready, LIVE.”‘ Beautiful language, Louise. Thank you!
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Naomi nails it again. This lovely, sad and affirming poem comes just when we all need to see our true faces again.
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Actually, Michael Simms wrote the poem based on a prompt by Naomi Shihab Nye.
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Naomi nails it again. This is a lovely, sad and affirming poem. Thank you for publishing it today when I need to see my true face.
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