With the coronavirus crisis upon us, we’ve launched a special Call for Submissions for a project we’re calling Pandemic Diaries. We want to hear about how working class people in our communities are handling life as this historical crisis unfolds.  What are you experiencing? What are you feeling? What are you struggling with and why? What’s going on around you? How are you and your family / community responding? Help us tell working class stories about this most historic event. 

What follows is our second entry (be sure to also check out our first entry, Touch) – a poem by Lindsey Williams, titled “I’m Sure You’ve Lost your Reasons, Too.”  

****

I’m Sure You’ve Lost Your Reasons, Too

by Lindsey Williams

I stay awake until it’s two
And sleep until the afternoon.
I don’t awake at 6 am,
Because I have no reason to.

The over-sleeping headaches, too,
Are new to quarantine living.
I don’t take meds to stop the ache
Because I have no reason to.

The Writing Lab I went into
Where I was blessed to tutor friends,
Can’t watch me help correct their work
Because I have no reason to.

The outfits that I’ve hung in two’s
Within my tiny closet here,
I haven’t worn, or washed, or moved
Because I have no reason to.

Those friends that I would run into
Those classmates, professors, and you,
Don’t hear the goofy jokes I tell
Because I have no reason to.

I’m sure you have your reasons, too,
Those reasons that you’ve lost these weeks,
A face, a laugh, a class, a place,
Well I’ve run out of reasons, too.

Lindsey Williams is an undergraduate sophomore student athlete at Flagler College in St. Augustine, Florida. Before pursuing her English degree and Cross-Country/Track & Field career at Flagler, Williams was born and raised in Hanover Township, Pennsylvania in the Wyoming Valley. Williams graduated from Holy Redeemer High School in Wilkes-Barre, PA, with the class of 2018. As a reader, writer, and artist at a young age, Williams continues to pursue her passion for the arts. She hopes to attend graduate school for either an MFA in Screenwriting, an MA in English Composition, or an MA in English Language and Literature.