Analysis: while pandemic-era poetry uncovers the vulnerabilities of humanity, it also reminds us that disasters do end
Indian poet and essayist Arvind Krishna Mehrotra describes his experience of living in the pandemic era as follows. My sense of mortality is keener than ever. In my garden, I look at an unfamiliar sapling and wonder if I would ever find out its name. Mehrotra s keen sense of mortality and heightened attention to his surroundings also acts as the driving force behind for how many poets are addressing these times.
Recent writing from Irish poets has especially focused on the collective experience of the altered reality around us. While sensory information has been an essential source of inspiration for several generations of poets, pandemic-era poets portray the sensory with an exceptional vigilance.
It’s easy to look at the past year and only see the negative impacts of the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic, but 2020 has given us a lot to be thankful for too.
Here are a few stories that brought us tremendous joy this year and gave us hope when we needed it most!
1. “Principal mom’s” embarrassing online school announcements had thousands cracking up.
“Just a reminder: Lunch today is whatever you make yourself,” Deb Plafker, a mom from Danville, California, said into her home’s announcement system in the early days of her kids’ remote learning. While her teenage son wasn’t nuts about her new (self-imposed) role of “principal mom,” even he agreed that her morning announcements were too funny not to share!