In The Lab After Work

It is unloosed!
A microorganism, once 
captive, deflecting light.
That crafty impulse
avoiding truth.
Little virus, evil isotope—
fugitive from the microscope
evading diagnosis
as I am 
eluding you. Eyes 

Spiral your design, flowering
round the edge of the Petri dish:
necklace of streptococci,
stray beads of staph. I spot 
you: a molecule of thought.
Now it is gone,
losing itself in my brain
encased by a meningitis 
of mind. You have infected a life,
and all writing of me is by us.

Copyright © by Kevan Copeland

A version of this poem appeared previously in Strip Mall Magazine.