Glossitis, and: Heroic

Abstract

Glossitis, and: Heroic Denise Duhamel and Maureen Seaton (bio) Radiculitis? That’s ridiculous, I said to the orthopedistabout the electricity in my neck running down to my pinkie. He didn’t laugh, so I pulled the word ovaritis out of myuvulitis and slapped it down on his endocarditis. Conjunctivitis, tonsillitis, laryngitis—I’d had it all,or so I thought. Doc, I’m no encyclopedist but I bet two can play this game with sinusitisor without. So if you’re trying to say it’s fasciitis I’m fascinated. Still, my shoulder feels like a stress balllodged in a chain-link fence. Is there a word for that? I didn’t think so. So don’t get your folliculitis in a twist.Don’t shivitis your coxitis. If you say it’s radiculitis OK, it’s radiculitis. I’ll store your medical jargon in my noggin.I’ll mitis my parotitis until there’s no pain left to believe in. Heroic As a surgery girl, you save money,you plan for years. Then all of a sudden [End Page 15] corona pops up, and you’ve got to dealwith these saggy boobs. Poor Wendy Williams—alcoholism, despicable ex-husband. Rich Wendy driving a Rolls-Royce.In fact, corona popping up like thathas put dampers on totally safe andnecessary things, one spokespersonfor The Time Before the Rumored Virusspit into his megaphone, right beforehanding it to Gramps, the designatedhitter, who asked Who wants bacon? The crowdchanted Open Tyson! Open Tyson! Meanwhile, the Tyson plant remains quite closedas the workers wait and the hogs wait andAmericans who need bacon wait waitwait. Today I couldn’t wait so I sliceda tomato, washed some lettuce, slatheredmayo on toast and pretended it wasa blt from the Lower East SideCoffee Shop. O, New York, with your jam-packedtenements and F train, we did have ussome good times, didn’t we? Kissing strangers,tagging walls with neon spray paint—Slumlord!Now swings in Tompkins Square Park are emptyand I’ve been missing you for thirty years.Get well soon, Broadway and Christopher Street. In the 80s, Broadway, Christopher Street,and Brooklyn came alive in Keith Haring’sSoho Pop Shop. He made “A Pile of Crowns,”an elegy for his friend Basquiatand iconic buttons “Stop aids Worldwide.”Who will draw this Pandemic? Make sense ofwhy the only ones psychotic enoughto write about the beauty of the wordcorona are the poets? Corona, [End Page 16] coronal, coronation, coroner.I can’t believe the color of the skyright now. Blue. As if the day is normal.Sea turtles still bury eggs. In two monthsa group of hatchlings will dig themselves out. Baby loggerheads still dig themselves upand out of those chilly Atlantic sandsand head toward the toasty Gulf Stream waters.I wonder who will emerge from our ownlive burial and who will hightail itto the Boardwalk’s lights or back to the sea?Me! Me! I think, wanting nothing more thanto dance at Margaritaville’s bandshellwith my sister, drunk tourists, toddlers, teens,the homeless, all swaying equal underthe moon. But will I be too scared? Will Ihesitate before the sand, the sea foam?Will everything I’ve known myself to bepush me forward into uncharted life? Remember Dolittle’s pushmi-pullyu,with one head that ate, another that talked?The creature’s great-grandfather was the lastunicorn, or so the Doctor believed.Scientists rush for a vaccine so we don’tgo the way of the Quagga or Dodo.Speaking of endangered birds (the Quagga?),my daughter (our go-to-stores heroine)came home with six baby chicks yesterday.Maybe not endangered yet, but awfully cute,and a way to self-sustain if the bugkeeps rampaging o’er the plains and Rockies.Quarantine soufflés! Stay-at-home quiches!In Florida, the go-to is Grubhub. [End Page 17] In Colorado, our governor’s gay,a Democrat, a Jew, which has nothingto do with how we order our takeout,but...