education
The High School for Crying
The College for Artists
who fear much more than dying

special skills
I can see things that are not there
I can take more than anyone can bear
I can work without lunch or dinner
I can let myself get thinner and thinner
I can suffer and still sing
I can be silent through almost everything

goals
I will write until I ache
I will sing until I break
I will give more than I take
I will make a mistake


wait


hold on

no, wait

please don't go

don't reject my resume

please no

I live in a time when we hide our faces
I live in a time when we still fight for equal rights for all races
I live in a time when school shootings are the norm
I live in a time when history is taking another new form

I live in a generation who jokes about death
I live in a generation who laugh and cry in a single shaky breath
I live in a generation who don’t believe the truth
I live in a generation who never had a happy youth

I live in a world while I scream and shout
I live in a world while no one lets me out
I live in a world while I am trying to cope
I live in a world while I cling to hope

I live in a place where school children are waiting to die
I live in a place where boys are told that “real men don’t cry”
I live in a place where dreams are killed
I live in a place where a higher death count means our leaders are skilled

Still, I live
In this place,
In this time,
And I will survive.

I live in a house
I live in a home
I live in a body I can call my own

I live in a bubble I’m trying to pop
I live in a mind unwilling to stop
I live in a note, a powerful song
I live in a voice that is still singing strong

When news of the pandemic reached my high school, no one was thinking of the impact that year.
We all thought that the government would never close our schools.
They would leave us to die, and we would wait to be killed.
The first thought when we were told that school would not be the same was, well this just means I won’t die by a bullet while trying to pass geometry.
When did trying to survive high school become so literal?
I am terrified that I will never hug my friends again.
I am terrified that I have had my last moments in high school.
I wanted a graduation.
I wanted a prom.
I wanted to sing and perform.
I wanted to be somewhat happy.
I don’t know how to stop this pain in my chest, spreading more and more hurting me beyond anyone’s comprehension.
I am so alone, and yet I crave the quiet.
It’s too loud, but no one is singing.
I just want to have the memories that everyone has.
I just want to hug my best friend again.
I want to worry about college, not how and when, and where I will die.
I want to be a kid, for the next few months.
Because this is the last chance I’ll get.
And the end of my childhood will be marked by months of being alone and devastated.
I just want to be a kid while I still can.

In virtual school you
see the teacher in one screen
- students in others.

My desk has four screens
two for class, one for browsing,
one for Face-Time.

Record yourself, loop
it as background, and it looks
like you’re engaged.  =]

Teacher: “Come ON, guys
you got this last year!” - and I
can't recall breakfast.

I'm NOT a nerd, I
just don't want to be working
with you at McDonalds.

I’m not a robot

I'm not some cog in a machine

I’m not some faceless doll that does stuff on repeat

I’m not an A.I that remembers your every word

I am here to learn…

But instead of learning about real life

I learn an illusion that's forced into my mind

Pointless facts, dates, numbers

all these things I must remember

Only to do all over again

Over and over and over

Pointless facts more numbers

again  and again, this cycle goes

I repeat

I'm not a robot

I am not your slave

I am a human with a life outside of school days

But I feel as though that has been taken away…

….and for what?…
Pointless facts, dates, Quizzes!?

You say you’re making leaders yet you only tell us how to listen.

How do expect us to succeed with a youth full of machines?!


I am not a robot
….
I am a student
….
And expect you to treat me as such

Sure, you're important
But how pretentious you say
That you are shaping the youth
A day at a day
But alas this is something You will never ever dare ponder
Because, you have a certain idea for what is proper
For What makes a student excel
Yet you can’t bear to comprehend
Why everyone doesn’t, so you expel
Expel your morals, beliefs, and ideas
onto the students that don’t even want them there
Yet this will never come to full fruition
because everybody needs something different in this **** institution
we all have strengths
we all have dreams
and things we enjoy
but these hardly line up with courses you employ

And yes, I know it is hard
We all want something else
But I have a right to miffed
when my education has gone south
my skills
My ambitions
My wants
This education seems to want anything but
I’m just tired of it all
Of my life being controlled by a number you install
Why is it you get to decide what’s important
Honestly, I find your lack of faith in me abhorrent

A crowd emerged
From classes upstairs
After washing their hands
They all sits here

In this room, biggest in the school
Where air is filled with, joyous molecules.
Oh, we had waited, for hours four
To step inside, the lunchroom's door

We all, me and my friends
Find ourselves on a bench
Our food in front of us
We join our hand.

A voice coming from mic
Sing a 'before meal rhyme'
Then start gossiping, this and that,
Enjoying the food, so good, we ate.

"Did you see the match, yesterday?"
"Me and my ma, are going to market on Sunday."
And we talk on every matter, that belongs to us
From a fantastic toy to every movie characters.

As soon as, we finished our meal,
Our lunch box, get sealed
And out of room,
We go in our classroom
But before we washed our hands,
As you all did after your meal

May be, it looks a little messy for you
But who cares?
Food and laugh, we all shares
In our, called with love, a lunchroom.

I go to school
To learn new things
And they taught me
"There is no place for curiosity."