in middle school i learned if you want to prevent a disease from marching in your body and conquering all that is clean the doctor can feed you a tiny bit of Disease with a little spoon which is a nicer name for needle
and in all outrageousness, your body will learn how to fight it off, never forgetting how.
that way, when the illness sneaks from its’ underground cave
and slithers into your body with a greater army
your body already knows how to fight it off.

vaccines.
that’s what they called ‘em.

nature is so incredible
and slightly indecisive like the rest of us I guess?
Infect yourself
to prevent infection?
Hurt yourself to prevent pain?
I'd laugh a little and tie my shoes with hang nailed fingers while I wondered
Couldn’t medication just obstruct the disease in the first place?
I sometimes liked to bite the end of my pencil, and smell the wood from those extra yellowy no.2 ones and only then could I answer the question on paper but
my question remained unanswered
and I grew to believe I could outsmart any disease

My question remained ignored until the blur of that night
the answer was written right before my incoherent eyes. maybe I had thought I was a Super Girl
with those bottles as my strength but now I know that Super
is just another word for silly, or perhaps overconfident and ignorant, so
when I peeled into the heavy morning from a sticky black night of regrets and dizzy thoughts
the raw angered voices rang in the aching drums of my ears
and startled the sleepy Super girl.
The sun rose
pulling out from the sorry black blanket of night
and I realized
my vaccination was complete.