Across The Grid
  ©2020 Louise Gallagher
  
 Across the grid
 of this digital universe
 we momentarily inhabit,
 faces smile and laugh
 brows furrow and foreheads crinkle.

 Sarah, sitting alone 
 in her box in London
 yawns and stretches as dusk settles in.
 She raises her glass 
 to the screen in front of her
 and takes a sip of wine.
 It's not really drinking alone, she hopes,
 when there's a virtual world of people
 right in front of her. 
 In LA, morning sunshine 
 streams through the window
 behind Jarred’s head.
 He wipes the sleep
 from his eyes
 and tries to shake off
 the dream he had last night
 as he takes another sip of coffee.
 While in Julia’s box down-under
 Tomorrow has already arrived.
 She can’t stay long. 
 She's got lots to do today.
  
 Amidst the ebb and flow 
 of conversation tethered 
 to an invisible web of binary code
 spinning around the globe,
 a fluffy black cat’s tail
 flits across the bottom
 of one, one-inch square,
 a brown and white dog
 patters through another
 paying no heed
 to the virtual world 
 of many lives 
 full of thoughts passing through
 unseen
 within each box 
 of constant dimensions
 holding everyone in place.
  
 Ripe with straight-laced consonants 
 and plump vowels rounding out
 the stream of conversation
 time keeps flowing
 past words and images
 cascading and falling
 into the constant flow
 of lives 
 gathered here
 in virtual reality.
 Connected
 yet so far apart.
  
 There is no time in the universe
 for distance
 to keep us apart
 in a locked down world. 

On Wednesday evenings, I gather with a group of five other women on Zoom for an hour and a half of writing and sharing.

Facilitated by Ali Grimshaw of the Flashlight Batteries blog, she reads aloud a poem by another author and invites us to write whatever those words inspire.

The poem above was inspired by a poem called Zoom Morning Weather, by Josh Jacobs.