Frank Joussen

Erkelenz, Germany

Frank is a German teacher and writer. His publications include two selections of his poetry, one of them being a bilingual collaboration with Romanian poet Ana Cicio. He has co-edited two international anthologies of poetry/fiction in India and one of short stories in Germany. His poems and short stories have also been published in a variety of literary magazines and anthologies in Australia, G.B. (The Poetry Kit, Caught in the Net, Pulsar etc.), the Republic of Ireland, Germany, Romania, Malta, the U.S.A., Canada, India, China, Thailand and Japan; some of them have been translated into German, Romanian, Hindi and Chinese.

 24^th May, 2020

My Little Quarantine

the flowers you´ve brought me

won´t blossom one bit

outside spring´s raving mad

with colours I only see indistinctly

through dirty window panes

with scents I can´t smell

with soft tissues I can´t touch

here in my quarantine cell

the physical distancing bit

is more or less digestible

your emotional remoteness

is much harder to stomach

the doubt if the virus

is spreading inside of me

is nothing compared to

my second thoughts about

your second thoughts

not only the flowers look

nipped in the bud at the

end of this spring.