
As we glide in and out of different phases of the pandemic, recalling when it started to make news takes one to a different world, a world where human interactions, travel, life — all of it seemed more predictable. I remember, I heard of it while in Yogyakarta in December 2019. At that time, we just knew of some new outbreak that had taken toll of a few human lives.
In three months, it became larger and larger and lockdowns became a reality. At some point, the outbreak was named a pandemic. Now, it seems to loom over us like a Sisyphean burden which rolls back to a fresh threat from a new variant just as we start to feel we have finally overcome the virus and made it to the peak, where we can resume our old ways. Is this a hint that we need to redefine our lives and change the tenor of our existence?
With eternal optimism for a weapon, mankind has overcome more deadly situations, when there were neither labs nor technologies to overcome diseases. Writers on our pages have reacted to the multiple outbreaks in varied ways. Here we present a selection of poems, stories and non-fiction from Mid-2021 that feature the onset of the new waves of the virus, which eventually will hopefully evolve to become an endemic. What is heartening to see is some writing has started to move towards a direction to define new ways to overcome the fear and darkness that seem to have been generated by the inability to bounce back to our ‘normal’ ways of living within a given timeframe. Perhaps, one should tend to agree with Keith Lyons, when he says in his essay: “I’ve learned to better cope with the challenges of life. As Jedi Master Yoda once said: ‘Named must be your fear before banish it you can’.”
Poetry
One Last Time by Heena Chauhan. Click here to read.
A Lament, A Prayer by Bibek Adhikari. Click here to read.
O Mother, O Father! by Ruchi Acharya. Click here to read.
Hope in Pandemic by Geetha Ravichandran. Click here to read.
Non-Fiction
Here, There, Nowhere, Everywhere
‘Did life change or did I change’ ponders New Zealander Keith Lyons. Click here to read.
Subhankar Dutta reflects on the role the police has taken in a pandemic torn world. Click here to read.
Fiction
Shobha Nandavar, a physician in Bangalore, depicts the trauma of Covid 19 in India with compassion. Click here to read.
Sheefa V. Mathews weaves lockdown and parenting into a story of a debuting dancer. Click here to read.