“Duo” © Dr. Regina Valluzzi

A Disturbed March

I am trapped in a different kind of lockdown,
as a conscripted soldier
on an energy draining forced march besieged
by rebels and chaos in the back of my brain,
forced to fight for the government.

Sixty days hunkered down, low on water,
with nothing to eat but leeks
and beans boiled in a weak soup,
alone except for my wife
and my imagination.

Social control measures to stop the spread of the coronavirus
are a wartime experience; you have many ways to spend your time.
“Not just fearing death but also how to reinvent your life.”
“No problem will last forever. Even if it takes a long time,
there will be a solution,” Keep patience.

Roger Carlisle is a 74-year-old, semi-retired physician. He currently volunteers and works in a free medical clinic for patients living in poverty. He grew up in Oklahoma and was a history major in college. He has been writing poetry for 10 years. He is currently on a journey of returning home to better understand himself through poetry. He hopes he is becoming more humble in the process.

Art can illuminate even the most elusive and difficult to comprehend ideas. Visual rules and tightly codified visual metaphors help scientists communicate complex ideas mostly amongst themselves, but they can also become barriers to new ideas and insights. Dr. Regina Valluzzi’s images are abstracted and diverged from the typical rules and symbols of scientific illustration and visualization; they provide an accessible window into the world of science for both scientists and non-scientists.