Mosquito Death

Stagnant, tepid pools
dot the landscape and the birds
of summer gather.

Tiny birds by the
billions fan outward searching
for the red liquid.

Like one bad plague, the
organism thrives onward
by killing each host.

The little bird stabs
each victim with a needle
snout, the germ invades.

And each year, more of
them are infecting the poor
and destitute ones.

It is the chess game
where castling too early
leads to quick checkmate.

Jerry Cantrell calls
it mosquito death rightly,
the main transmitter.

The Plasmodium
protists plant themselves within
the liver’s boundaries,

and then moves onto
the red blood cells bypassing
the immune system.

Circumventing the
spleen by adhesive proteins,
the parasite lives.

The vaccine is not
there yet, but mosquito nets
and quinine are there.

Problem is, the poor
cannot afford even these
very basic needs.

So people raise the
awareness of the sickness
so the world can help.

They control it with
spraying the breeding grounds and
health education.

The scourge that is death
by mosquito is fought to
the bone tooth and nail.

From Ronald Ross to
Charles Lavernan, mankind
has fought the protist.

The goal is now to
eradicate the germ, no
more malaria.

Reviews

[TLK]

"Circumventing the
spleen by adhesive proteins,
the parasite lives."

Nice assonance (of the elongated 'e' sound) to make this science into poetry. Truly excellent.

I am also happy to have looked up 'protist' today. Technical vocabulary can be useful... teenage years spent talking about deism have clearly caused creation in me tonight.

I have heard some people allege that the fight against malaria is so tepid as it mainly affect the world's poor. It saddens me that it is even possible that the profit motive can keep us from treating other humans like brothers. Surely the greatest riches can be forged through co-operation.

Or maybe I'm just an idiot.