At 10:00 am, less than 100 students walked out to the flagpole
for our school's second walkout.
While there was less than one fourth of the population from the first walkout,
it was so much more powerful.
So many voices were heard.
We screamed, cried, laughed, read poems,
and all silently wished for a riot; wished for change.
We all wished that we didn't have to do this.
Wished that we didn't have to fear being shot at school,
the place where we are supposed to be safest.
But in that moment,
we were one.
We hugged, rested our heads on each other's shoulders,
and were one giant support system.
We are going to make change.

if words are food for the mind,
then here is a glimpse of mine
if words are drugs for the brain,
then here is why i'm so pained.

abandoned, abhorrent
abnormal, absent
abstract, abuse
addicted, anxious

betray, bitterly
blank, blasphemy
bloodless, breakdown
breathless, brutal

captive, casually
catastrophe, cautiously
change, cigarettes
crucial, clueless

damaged, dangerous
deadly, disastrous
disheartened, disconcerting
dramatic, dreading

eager, eccentric
ecstasy, eerie
effete, effortless
embittered, excess

faded, failure
faintly, fallacy
faltering, fatally
fearfully, finally

garbage, gawky
gibberish, gloomy
gone, goodbye
graphic, gratify

hallucinate, harshly
hazy, heartless
hectic, helpless
hesitant, hit-and-miss

idiotic, idly
ignorant, intimacy
illogical, imaginative
infatuated, intoxicated

jealousy, jittery
journey, journal
joylessly, judicial
junk, juvenile

keen, killing
knavish, knocking
knockout, knotty
knowingly, knowledge

laborious, lacking
lame, languishing
lifeless, literature
lovelorn, lugubrious

madness, maintenance
make-believe, malaise
mean, melancholic
mellow, melodramatic

naff, naivety
nameless, naturally
nauseous, nebulous
neglected, nervous

oasis, objectionable
obliged, obliterate
oblivion, obscurity
obsolete, one-and-only

pacifist, pained
pale, panicky
paradise, paralyze
passionately, passively

raging, ranting
rationalize, raving
realistic, reasonable
rebellious, reckless

saboteur, sadness
sake, sameness
sanity, satisfactory
scar, steady

taint, tangled
tasteless, tearful
telling, temperamental
terror, theoretical

unaffected, uncanny
uncommon, unconsciously
undesirable, uneasy
unfortunate, untidy

vaguely, vanish
vanity, vanquish
versatile, vicious
violence, voracious

waiting, waking
walkout, wanting
wasteful, weary
withering, wrecking

if words are food for the mind,
then you've seen a glimpse of mine
if words are drugs for the brain,
then no wonder i'm so pained.

*-djs

Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                        A Student Walkout with Hissy-Chants

But

I heard of one student who refused to go
Who bravely thought for herself, and so said no
And she’s the one student I want to know

They're practicing democracy .. Bravissimo !

ప్రకాశం  లో  sri prakash మల్లే  
ప్రశాంతమైన   వాతావరణం లోనే  
ప్రదీపాల్లా  వెలిగామే.
నాలుగు  వర్షాలు  వనవాసాలే  
నలు  వైపులా  పుర్తయ్యాయే  
నవ  లోకానికే  ఇది  శ్రీకారమే .
మాటలు  వేరైనా. . .ప్రాంతాలు  వేరైనా. . .అలవాట్లు  వేరైనా. . .  
విహంగాలుగా   విహరించామే   ఇన్నాళ్ళు  ఈ  చోటా . .
తర  తరాలా  కదల  మళ్లీ  ముందుకే  వచ్చింది  రా  
వీడ్కోలు   అంటూ  walkout చేయాలే . .
అనుభవాలనే  పంచేస్తూ  జ్ఞానాన్నే  అందించిన  పండితులనుంచి  sendoff­ తీసుకోవాలా. .
పూర్తైన  పాఠం  లా  చివరాకరికే  వచ్చేసాము  
labs అంటూ  తిరిగమే  project అంటూ  వెలుతున్నామే  . .
కలిసుండే  కలం  అంతా  కరిగిపోయింది  
కష్టం  ఉన్నా  సరే  ఇష్టం  గా  స్వికరించాలే .
I am missing my college
SRI PRAKASH COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING

They love you more than they love themselves
They only want what's best for you
They treat you with respect
But toughen you when it's required to
They stress you not because they're punishing you
But because they're worried about you
They sometimes spoil you
Because they love to see you smile
They feed you a meal x3 a day
And buy you your favorite chocolate milk
Which makes you happy to hangout with them
Instead of being with your friends playing video games

But now things changed

You're all grown up
Fussing and screaming all day
Because you don't want to do your homework
You want to play outside with your mates
The moment you walkout from the front door of your home
You're invisible and uncontrollable
With no curfew. You're always late

But things have changed

All of a sudden you're an old man
With a wife, 3 kids and a dog
It's all heavy on your shoulders
Lifting all the weight
Struggling with your work
And then coming back home
To your wife and 3 kids
But it isn't all that great
Cause they constantly cause problems
And dont appreciate your sweat
And that's when you remember
All the days you spent
Being arrogant, selfish and stubborn to your parents
How you raised their heart rate
And raised your voice on them to the highest level
As if you were special
And now you ask yourself "how didn't I notice?"
You were too blind to see
Too cold to feel and
Too deaf to hear
All the struggle your parents went through

But things are now stable

*Wasn't it all worth the wait.

A union man
makes his plan
with an idle hand

one million belong
one million strong
one million wrong

we have your back, just pay your dues
we will give the answers to all the clues

we will tell you when to work or strike
we will write your good book and be god-like

you will become a scab if you dont conform
just sign this and be safe from the storm

walkout turns to lockout and un-employment
out of work as you watch the scab deployment

A union man
makes his plan
with an idle hand

one million belong
one million strong
one million wrong

Sitting on her dorm room bed
Three feet from the floor
Not quite happy
But not quite sad
She wants to feel the ache in her bones
The hatred she has for herself
She wants that to come back
she doesn’t want to feel ok
Cause she’s not
Trying to make that decision
To walkout in the middle of the night
While her room mate sleeps
And to never come back
She’s ok right now
But she wants that sadness
The depression to fill her bones
She wishes she could pull the metaphorical trigger
And not live
Oh how she aches
To just want to not be ok anymore
Because when you’re not ok
You feel alive
Or at least she does
It’s terrible beast
She hates when she’s ok but hates when she’s sad
She just wishes she could not exist
That would be her ultimate goal
She types this in the dark as her roommate drifts off to sleep
I know cause that girl is me

Seventeen minutes of silence;
Seventeen balloons released;
Seventeen roses in loving
Remembrance of those now deceased.

Tens of thousands of students in schools
Across the country expressed their grief
And solidarity together
In what has become a recurring motif.

Americans by the millions
Increasingly are finding their voices--
Speaking out, demanding change,
Reminding us that we have choices.

Do we choose to do nothing
And cower before the NRA,
Or do we say enough is enough
And get this change underway?

Speak up: no more mass shootings
Or ****** bodies covered with sheets.
Demand real solutions and keep
Assault-style weapons off our streets.

In the age of never-ending wars,
Political chaos, corporate greed,
And out-of-control gun violence,
Our youth are planting a hopeful seed.

May that seed grow and flourish!
Meanwhile, read the names below--
The names of those who lost their lives
At a school in Florida one month ago:

Alyssa Alhadeff, 14
Scott Beigel, 35
Martin Duque, 14
Nicholas Dworet, 17
Aaron Feis, 37
Jaime Guttenberg, 14
Chris Hixon, 49
Luke Hoyer, 15
Cara Loughran, 14
Gina Montalto, 14
Joaquin Oliver, 17
Alaina Petty, 14
Meadow Pollack, 18
Helena Ramsay, 17
Alex Schachter, 14
Carmen Schentrup, 16
Peter ****, 15

-by Bob B (3-14-18)

we watch it unfold.
their love. if it was ever permanently there to begin with.
i think they watch their time closely.
i like to hope.
so maybe when he hated her the first time, it didn't hurt as much.
i close my eyes.
sometimes i cry.
but usually i sit cross legged and wait for her to walkout of the bathroom.
she banished her soul to his reserved moments of breathless pause.
and that is how i learned what love is.

day
the soul trapped
in body
In night
Soul just walkout
from us
to live unconditional life
an adventure
we call it dream
But
the adventure was real
that's why
you feel live in dreams....