It’s hard to pick up a textbook

Write essays, take tests

When we’re mourning the loss of lives

We are still living

Waking up every day to go to our own funerals

Crying with the people over who we used to be

The most intimate type of pity party

The days that are gone

We feel every single one

Deep paper cuts across our souls

Months are mere seconds

To these blood-shot eyes

A never-ending loop of sameness

An inescapable eternity

For these immortal versions of us

Zoom classes are constant reminders

Of what we cannot have

Of the distance between us

We plaster on fake smiles

Masks of normalcy

Saying we are fine

Those polite little lies

More empty and hollow

Than the thoughts of tomorrow

We grieve for ourselves

 We grieve for each other

We have all lost so much

But will keep on surviving

That is all we can do

To honor the lives that were once ours