Tattoo
Cannot undo what has been done Faded pain, never gone Ink under the skin Permanence forever drawn
There are some thoughts that persist with me regarding ink. The metaphorical ink of COVID-19 has become a literal artistic medium for me. I have also been writing like my liberation from fear won’t happen without first getting one million words on paper. I have moved a lot from inside my mind out on to paper, but I have so much in my head that doesn’t seem like it will ever be free.
I spent a day…four hours of one day…immersed in actual physical pain to have a chance of distracting from the emotional overload. I didn’t choose COVID-19 of course. None of us did. I didn’t choose anxiety either. I didn’t choose my chronic issues…physical, mental, or logistical.
I chose ink though. I chose to take something that was “infection” and inject it into my body to create immunity. This was the first of a few doses of vaccine to protect my life from lack of choice.
I did it for me. I don’t show you, world. My grandfather would certainly have disapproved, and he wouldn’t have been the only one. We are, the world over, deciding for ourselves whether or not we will accept a vaccine against this global pandemic. I took both doses immediately, and at the same time, I accepted the marks on my back that say this year changed my body’s reaction to the world forever.
Yes, I got a tattoo. Yes, it hurt like hell. No, it is not small. No, it will not be my last. Yes, it was my choice. No, I am not worried about what it will look like when I am 90 years old. Yes, it was necessary. No, I don’t need to justify it. Yes, I realize I still am offering justification.
Vaccination
Under the skin the needle leaves traces
Drips the foreign agent, strangers without faces
Invading the system to make immunity form reinforced braces
To make the body become the strongest of impenetrable places
It pinches and burns, the site of inoculation
The throb and fatigue soon follow without consolation
Chills shake and the brain aches, marching toward amelioration
Toward smiles not hidden by masks against anxious contamination
The ink comes inside with needles through skin
Through reactions we grow stronger within
We become immune and only then - we begin
To choose, to fight, to create, to love...
- to win.
Mudança 
Omg
…
The poem has such a beautiful wide cadence. Making your point so strongly. Yet without force.
Then there’s the blog itself…
I was so moved by the simple yet essential nature of the choices you’ve made. Those at the end of the piece I’ll maybe return to.
But that central choice…the vaccine, using some of the oh so very dark ink as a way to shield yourself from the fuller effects of that pervasive darkness, knowing what I do of you and how your art has helped you process the last year…it was very been incredible to see you transfer that to your body.
An act of trans substantiation. The poison of the ink transmuted by your exercise of your will (my definition of Magic) into a protective totem borne forever on your skin.
Thank you for sharing
All my love
A
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