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# Red Eye
- URL: https://dianaludwick.com/red-eye/
- Published: 2026-07-19T14:48:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-07-19T14:48:00.000Z
- Description: “Red Eye,” a contemporaneous poem about the impact of Canadian wildfires on a mid-Atlantic town, written Sunday, July 19, 2026 poem number 200(!) in a series of 365 poems written by Diana Ludwick in 2026. Photo by Diana Ludwick (c) 2026.
- Author: Diana Ludwick
- Tags: 2026 Poetry Challenge, Current Events, Dry Humor, Generational, Humor, Of Place, Poems, Short-form Musings, Uncategorized, AQI, Blood Red, Canadian, Free-Range, High Summer, July, Metaphor, N95 Mask, Reboot, Red Eye, Summer, Two Hundred, W.T.F., Wildfires, #Migrated-1792872215677, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-10-24 20:03

Sunrise is blood red  
thanks to free-range Canadian fires  
I inhale the acrid atmosphere   
and squint with unslept eyes.  
The air is "Code Purple"  
which I have to look up  
— because W.T.F. —  
it means an "AQI of 300"  
— which I also Google —  
and I learn I should be  
sheltering in a fitted N95 mask  
to escape a world  
which is doing its best   
to unplug and reboot us.  
If only there   
was a metaphor in this.