Member Poetry: Our Creativity Still Thrives
COVID-19
By Becca Rosselli
I see the headlines on the News I watch my family’s panicked faces An illness coming for us all Nondiscriminatory to our races I watch the life that I once knew Quickly turn to shambles We dash to the store to buy our eggs As the worlds becoming scrambled The shopping malls are closed My favorite bookstore too Their jobs are now in holding As they try to make it through They say they cannot stock the shelves And toiletries an issue In search of comfort in misplaced love It makes me grab my tissues We watch the numbers on tv Growing and coming fast We hug our families before we work Hoping it won’t be the last We help you because we love you To keep you safe from harm We were called and so we answered To be your healing charm The sacrifices that I’ve known I hope you never have to make The next time I hug my daughter Left between history and fate There are no words that can be placed To properly name my sorrow I only know our unity today Will help us build tomorrow Becca Rosselli is an LPN at Newfane Rehabilitation and Health Center in Newfane, NY.
8
March-April 2020
“Staten Island is very small. We are really feeling the wrath of this thing. When I was growing up, we had five hospitals. Today we have three and only one level one trauma center on the island. Every day I wake up and get on my hands and knees and pray these numbers don’t keep going up. Everyone knows someone who is affected, infected or dead.” — Kim Fish, PCA, Staten Island University Hospital North
resources, President Trump used public appearances to air personal grievances, cast doubt on the vast need for supplies and resources, and humiliate the journalists tasked with reporting the almostincomprehensible crisis. As of early April, there were more than 311,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the United States and just shy of 8,500 deaths. National and local experts predict a grave expansion of those numbers and an epidemic that will tear through even the most rural parts of the country like wildfire.
The New York Times caregivers are in the “The government knew trenches, helping reported on April 5 about this since 2019. that the number of heal the very sick, They should have cases nationally was and too often, beside made sure that we had COVID victims as expected to double enough PPE and that every five days. they cross over As the COVID-19 we were alerted to this to the other side, situation. They knew a fire burns, hundreds stepping in for family pandemic was coming of thousands of loved cruelly robbed and now it’s here and caregivers and we don’t have what we by the virus of the frontline responders opportunity to help need to handle it.” are at work saving ease the way and say — Carol Wills, CNA, Terence lives and fighting last goodbyes. Cardinal Cooke Care Centre, New York, NY the outbreak. As These pages many of us watch the are just a glimpse once-unimaginable scenes of of 1199ers during this crisis, sickness and death from afar, our doing what they do every day: Undertaking a deadly risk and walking into hospitals, nursing homes, and private homes to do the job of caring for others. In the coming months, we will have a more comprehensive story of our members, their heroism, and their part in healing our country and the world. But for now, these pages are the story of today, and they represent the incredible strength of the 1199 army, and their fight against an invisible enemy.
