Sophie Corless

The Ebola in the Room

Why is it that when I type in google “how to get,”
it assumes I am a worried westerner
afraid of the disease less likely to kill me
than driving home after school?
When I chomp down on a roast beef sandwich
and proceed to swallow the gnawed cow,
shouldn’t I be worried that my epiglottis
might get stage fright
letting the meat
slide down my airway,
into my lungs,
and kill me?
The world is grey like the tough wrinkled
skin of an elephant in Africa,
grey like the suit of Kim Jong Un,
grey like the rockets used on the people of Palestine,
grey like the camera used to record beheadings by ISIS,
grey like my sweater made in Taiwan,
grey like the crusted and battered lungs of a smoker
who will pass away long before one of my high school’s
football players contracts Ebola.