With ashened hands and heart

Scorched dry heart,

mapped on the faces

Of young and old,

rich and poor alike.

Caught by a climate change of a pandemic,

breaking on the surface of the world,

some condemned as heartless.

Scorched dry heart

etched on the faces

Of you, me, him, her

And that lone homeless one.

Mirrored, reflected back in koala eyes.

Water, cupped in ash smeared hands, offered now

by weary worried worn fireman.

Scorched dry heart,

pinched in broken lines

of blurred boundaries,

and upside down worlds.

devoid of hugs, kisses and warm touch

as disasters tug apart

the very strings securing the essentials of life.

Scorched dry heart,

wrapped in masks of silence.

Tied by the very chords

that once uttered recognition.

Muffled sounds emanating

as ventilated breath

bids fatal farewells.

Alone,

Alone now in the stillness of isolation

Thunder clapped awakening

Cracks soil and hearts alike.

A puddle of a pool forms,

In the eye of the giver

Mirroring tears of pent up emotions, spilt out on scorched hearts.

Koala crumpled faces world wide,

are one in that moment,

that moment of instant recognition

In the vulnerability and the emptiness.

Time and place have no bounds now.

Ashened scorched hands

promises met in a cleansing moment of hope.

Houses will be built.

Vaccines world wide will be found.

A climate change

breaks the drought,

stills raging flames,

In that moment when the koala in us

Laps water in ashened hands.

– Sister Marie Casamento SGS