the boiler man comes to do the service

Rachel Burns

dragging his Henry vacuum cleaner
up the stairs

he doesn’t wear a mask

i continue 
supporting my dyslexic daughter 
in a virtual classroom

Genome Organelle Oncogene
Golgi Apparatus Ribosome Mapping

the teacher has two dogs both asleep on the sofa

i wonder what they’re called?

Nucleus Cytoplasm Membrane
Mitochondria Cell Wall Chloroplasts Vacuole

i ask my daughter, she doesn’t know 

John shouts downstairs the boiler is leaking
he shows me a pool of water 

i go back to helping my daughter 
read her words she does not understand

i think about John going house to house 
with his Henry vacuum cleaner

not wearing a mask

leaving his cells behind 
like a crime scene

The Science

I was supporting my daughter with SEN during a lesson on cells (neither of us found it very interesting) when the boiler man came to do the service. He wasn't wearing a mask despite the COVID restrictions/ guidance in place. It made me think about cells in a different way.

The Poet

Rachel Burns lives in Durham City. Her debut pamphlet, A Girl in a Blue Dress, is published by Vane Women Press. She is recently published in Butcher’s Dog, Fragmented Voices, The Poetry Village and The Blue Nib. Her poem, ‘Pegs’ was selected for The Poetry Archive’s ‘Wordview 2020’ project.

Next poem: A bacterial cell wall’s view of penicillin by Stephen Paul Wren