I often wear myself out
without going anywhere:

Why did you say that?
Why did you do that?
What will they think of you?
Oh I wish I hadn't gone!

Then:

Forget it, you're really not that significant.
They don't spend time thinking about you.
No one gave a second thought
to what you said or what you did.

Finally:

Besides, they have their own interior monologue,
their own enemy within.
Not all of them surely?
No, not all. Envy the bliss of the ones who don't
but rejoice you lack their ignorance.

I often wear myself out
without getting anywhere.

Everyday I catch your smile;
it’s infectious.
I can’t help but smile when you walk down the corridor
wearing that smile.

Or when you sit in class
trying your best to understand
what I've just said.

But once you’ve walked past
or left my class
I can’t help but cry.

For I know that your smile masks fear.
I know that your smile conceals grief.
Fear that the things you saw before you left
will be visited on your mother, who couldn't leave.
Grief; for the father killed in front of your eyes.

Though you try your best to hide it,
your eyes reveal that you know more of this world than I do.
And yet I am supposed to teach you.

Thank you for coming
and sorry I couldn’t make it.

Could I ask a favour?
Remember me for who I am today.

Not today, for today I am not here,
but the day I wrote this
then I was.
Remember her.
Remember me.

Don’t pretend I was something I’m not.
Don’t pretend I was someone I’m not.
Don’t seek refuge in a past that does not exist
anywhere other than your imagination

For the imagined past,
our imagined past,
is just that.
It is imagined and it has passed.

Save your tears, your kind words.
Save your praise and anecdotes.
Save it all, because they are not for me.
They are for you.

Your presence was not requested
while I was dying to meet you.
But now? You are there
and I am dust.

So thank you for coming
and sorry I couldn't be with you.