We go from isolation

To soft openings

Reduced capacity

Masks on everyone you see

Social distancing

6 feet apart when we all ache for touch

3 months without friends without familiar places

3 months without handshakes and hugs

We go not back to normal

But to a new normal where we wonder

Will it ever go back to what it was

Cafe mochas and the presence of others

While i sit and type I’ve missed them so

We go back to my questions I’ve asked about self isolation

Will i go back to the way I was or will I reach out

3 months on and still no closer to an answer

Yet here i am and still i soldier on

Into a great unknown

Still we all soldier on into a great unknown

We all march into a future that is bright and dark and UNKNOWN

We still march

For what else can we do

We march ever onward unto a destination we hope to find familiar

Not knowing what we’ll find

Will we continue to be as kind

Will we remember the months of loneliness and isolation

Will we seek to forever change it

To fend off the loneliness we all felt

That we know some feel all the time

What will our new normal be

Will it be filled with hope

Or despair

As always the future is what we make it

What will we as a community

As a city

As a state

As a nation

As a world

What will we make of a future that is yet unwritten

May it be forever bright

May it be better than we hope and dream

Even though i hold no such illusions for myself

Since I have seen the worst of man

I hope for a future clean and bright

But prepare for a future that is not so

May i be proven wrong

In this new normal

May it better than what I expect

And better than I dare to hope and dream.