The Return of Polio

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL HEALTH

The Return of Polio

 

You have a right to believe

Anything you want to believe

As long as it does no harm

To any other living being

But when your beliefs

Become weapons that harm and kill

You no longer possess that right

 

You may choose to believe

Against all empirical evidence

Against all accumulated knowledge

For reasons political or societal

That vaccines are works of the devil

That science and medicine are facades

Invented to control the masses

That polio and the Spanish flu

Were not the threats we are told they were

But when your actions or inactions

Result in the needless suffering

Of your children and mine

Then you have lost your way

And must somehow be reclaimed

No one wants a mandate

But in matters of health and survival

Mandates become necessary