It's been an elliptical time

 CW: sickness, covid

I measure my time with covid in cups of tea. 

Not food, for I have no appetite. 

When a body is used to biking sixty miles

To hiking mountains and wrestling trees 

And it finally finds itsself stilled--food seems uninteresting 

(my body is uninterested)

And not with sleep--the fickle friend

I stay up long hours into the night, thrashing and sweaty under the covers

And nap fitfully throughout the day time

My sleep losing the careful meter I have come to enjoy

A broken metronome swinging wildly and without reason

I work the same: in fits and starts, sloppy unedited emails from my phone

Maybe in the afternoon, maybe at 2am

(I have nothing else to do)

But I carefully measure out the tea--I know my body needs the liquid

Hot and minty, or sometimes green

I boil the whole kettle and slowly drip it into myself

My body takes it more easily on some days then others

And like this, as the tea disappears and becomes me

I know some time has passed.