I had a practice in the city’s heart, amid the rush of morning starts,
And noticed there a strange malaise, creeping through the bustling ways.
No fever’s heat marked those affected, yet something in their eyes reflected
Movements restrained, calm and mild, responses too precisely filed.

My hospital at Fourth and Key, where fluorescents flickered endlessly,
The waiting room spilled past its walls, and emptied faces filled my halls.
Each day brought more who seemed struck low, their voices muted, movements slow,
“I don’t know what’s wrong,” they’d murmur thin, and so this virus settled in.

The health boards met with furrowed brow, where data told them that somehow
Cases were rising, floor by floor, through every firm on every shore.
“Find the source,” they bid me go to highest towers, deepest lows.
And so through gleaming gates I passed, to where the outbreak had amassed.

The Office, crown of commerce high, where innovation ought to fly.
Where progress marched in pristine sheen — or so the brochures liked to preen.
Yet something in the air sat strange, like music played in too low range,
Or colors faded one degree, so slight that few would stop to see.

Past desks in rows of perfect square, I paced around with watchful care,
Past signs that glowed ‘Achieve’ and ‘Thrive’, I sought some symptom to derive.
But each new floor was neatly laid, and each diagnosis would slowly fade,
As though my searching made it worse—this unnameable reverse.

People glanced up from their screens, their manner neither warm nor mean;
“You’re here to solve what ails us, yes? Though nothing’s wrong that I can guess.”
My notes grew thin, my spirits too, and I began to think this through:
For how to heal what cannot feel? What medicine could ever seal
A wound that no one claims to bear? I packed my bag with dull despair.
When there! A flash of crimson bright, half-hidden from the office light.

A canvas corner, peeking shy, beneath reports stacked mountain-high,
And at that desk, with studied pose, a figure neither friend nor foe,
Who caught my gaze and shifted quick to hide that glimpse of color sick,
As though such art was so corrupt! His shoulders tensed, his jaw locked shut.

“Just something old,” he mumbled low, when asked if he would let it show,
“It doesn’t matter anyway.” But his fingers traced it as he lay
The canvas flat beneath reports. “My friend—” I started, but he retorts:
“We’re not—” then stopped, his manner tight, as though all cheer might bring some blight.

“Then stranger,” changed I, “shall we walk? The air might ease us into talk
Of art and such.” He rose unstirred, each movement weighed like measured word,
As though to show he didn’t care what secrets might await out there.
Yet still he led me toward the door, his footsteps echoing the floor.

Through quiet streets we made our way, past towers piercing light of day,
Until we reached, some blocks ahead, a gallery where silence spread.
Here stark white walls held captive art, each canvas hung six feet apart,
My guide spoke flat of modern taste: “Clean lines, no fuss, no time to waste.
See how we’ve stripped away excess? True beauty lies in emptiness.”
But in his voice, a tremor slight betrayed a longing for delight.

We traced dead alleys to plaza bare, where no one danced in autumn air,
Past cafés where no laugh rang true, where couples sat with practiced view
Of screens that cast their hollow glow, through lanes where only shadows grow.
How hearts had learned to shrink and fold! We wandered till the day grew old.

Now at last I saw it clear: this was no illness drawing near.
These souls had learned to dim their light, to shield their hearts from day and night,
To craft a careful emptiness, wear distance like a second dress.
And as the shadows lengthened slow, I watched my guide’s pretense to show
No hint of feeling, no display — yet something in his eyes would stray
To every splash of untamed hue, every spark of life still breaking through.

So soft I spoke, “You must be cold, with nothing in your chest.”
He paused his march, and turned, at last, to face this final test.

“Of course I’m tired," he whispered true, “Of caring when the world’s askew,
When every fight seems lost before it’s fought, when opening your door
To hope means letting in the pain.” I waited while he spoke again:
“It’s easier to float above, than sink beneath that weight of love.”

His truth rang clear, and not just his own, for who had not wished to postpone
The ache of hoping, day by day? Yet something made me need to say:
“My friend—” “Not that again,” he sighed. But this time I would not subside:
“Yes, friend, for that’s what you could be, if you would share this pain with me.”
He flinched, but did not turn away, and so I found the words to say:

“This beautiful universe vast, through billion years has come at last
To know itself through human eyes, through hearts that laugh and hands that rise
To make, to feel, to burn so bright, to reach beyond the edge of night

 and you would dim this sacred light?”

We stood in silence for a while, as sunset painted mile by mile
The city’s edge in burning gold. Then something in his bearing told—
Not shattered, no, but cracked to show a spark I knew would grow and grow.

His shoulders eased, his guard unbound, and toward the sun without a sound
He turned at last, with eyes that shone. “Perhaps,” he said, in warmer tone,
“I’ve works I’ve never dared to share?” I smiled at this moment rare.
“That’s what a friend is for.” And through twilight shade and something more,
As we walked back to his office floor, this city felt warmer than before.

Inspired by The Rememberer by Exurbia and work by Nathan Zed.