evidence: When she sat down at her computer one morning this spring, Kitty O’Meara didn’t intend to write an iconic poem, a children’s book or an opera. But in roughly 20 minutes, she did all three. [...] Oprah magazine went further, calling O’Meara "the poet laureate of the pandemic." Ever humble, O’Meara was tickled by the accolade: "It was hyperbolic and generous and very kind. I don’t think it’s affected my sense of self or my importance in the literary world." [...] As for those who deny the reality of the coronavirus, O’Meara is characteristically generous. For many, she says, the "excuses were perhaps political, but their rage, and denial, and fear seemed more about deep sadness regarding their loss of control, and all the other pain and grief they’ve been carrying around." For them, she suggests, "it felt freeing, I suppose, and perhaps offered a defiant satisfaction to be out unmasked and daring the virus to prove itself."