COVID-19 has cost a lot of people the lives of people they love. While I haven’t lost a loved one to COVID-19, it definitely has had me thinking about it. Around easter, I was thinking about this topic.
I write a lot of poems from an empathetic perspective, imagining myself in someone else’s shoes. So, I found myself imagining:
- Being in a hospital room with a spouse, significant other, or best friend, connected to ventilators, on life support.
- Being a parent by a sick child’s bed, wondering – is this COVID-19? Or just a cold or flu? Should I take them to the hospital? It’s so expensive. I lost my job and can’t afford the medical bills if they say it’s just a flu and send me away.
- Being an old woman, next to a sickly old man, knowing the disease is likely going to kill them, and wanting to die with them rather than be left alone.
I was laying next to my husband, thinking about people going through those kinds of things, imagining the pain or grief I would be feeling now, if I had been (or was, in the future) in that situation with my husband, or my children.
Hearing my husbands heart beat under my ear as I cuddle next to him and he sleeps, and thinking of God and Easter and my husband the atheist, I was inspired to write this song. I say song, because in my head, it is a song. But I haven’t found anyone to help me actually write out the lyrics, and haven’t developed that skill-set yet.
I tried submitting it to a newspaper to share, but didn’t hear back from them. I could have saved it for a future publication or attempt to win a poetry competition, but I think the world needs it more, now. If it inspires feelings in you, please comment, and let me know how it touched you, or if it inspired you to do anything (like give a loved one a hug). I love the concept of functional poetry that can inspire positive change. Trying to start a movement around that, but so far, it’s a vision of just 1 (aka, me).
Hey God
(c) By Alice Vo Edwards 4/21/2019
Hey god
If you’re out there…
Can you hear me?
I’m just lying here
Sending up a prayer
To the man upstairs.
To the man upstairs
Hoping that you hear my prayers
Can you hear me?
Lying here
There’s nothing in this world
More precious than this heart beat
Next to me
Beating steadily
Oh, so rhythmically.
But this world
Is so often hard and hurting
I can scarily imagine
That something bad could happen
And this heart beating next to me
Oh so very rhythmically
Could be stilled.
And little could be worse in my life
Then to have this heart beat die.
So yeah, that’s why
I’m just lying here
Sending up a prayer
To the man upstairs.
Maybe it’s been a while
And I should have called more often
But I’m not calling for me
Or, well, at least not completely selfishly.
I just wanted to say
Thank you for this life—
No, not mine—
Thiers—
This beating heart next to me
What would I need to do
Could I trade you
To keep it beating?
I would give my own if I could
Yes, I would
They’d be better of without me
Than I would be, left alone
Without them…
So yeah, that’s why
I’m just lying here
Sending up a prayer
To the man upstairs.
Hoping that you hear my prayers
Just to thank you for another heart beat
Another moment
Of joy in my life, with them by my side
And I want another—
Please, keep them alive
Don’t let them die
Don’t leave me alone here
I’d rather go, too.
So god if that makes me selfish
Maybe I am—
And maybe that’s why
I chose now to pray
In all of this time
Of all possible days
Maybe it’s love
That’s brought me back to you
They might not believe
Can I believe enough for two?
Is my love enough
To alter our destinies
To make you choose me
If anyone must die?
Maybe that’s why
I’m just lying here
Sending up a prayer
To the man upstairs.
To the man upstairs
Hoping that you hear my prayers
Hey, God.
Are you out there?
If you’re out there,
Hear my prayer.