Viruses are tiny packs

of genes with DNA

all coated in a protein shell

and that is how they stay.

 

They cannot grow or reproduce.

They couldn’t win a fight,

until they find themselves a host.

Become a parasite.

 

For when its shell (or capsid) sticks

upon the right cell wall,

it penetrates its way inside.

Invaders one and all.

 

Inside the cell its coat dissolves

releasing all its genes

that force the cell to make lots more

of virus’s machines.

 

And when that cell’s exhausted and

its functioning has ceased,

its walls break down so hundreds

of the virus are released.

 

And they in turn find other cells

to replicate their kind.

An alien dictatorship

with just themselves in mind!

 

We haven’t found a medicine

to stop them in their tracks.

But being vaccinated primes

our bodies for attacks.

 

Some viruses are deadly while

some others make us ill.

And some don’t do much harm at all

and never ever will.

 

In fact we think that some are friends

that helped us on our way

to owning our complexities

of genes and DNA.

 

When tracing back genetic codes

through evolution’s tree,

it seems that we are eight percent

of virus – you and me!

 

https://kids.britannica.com/kids/article/virus/390098