Semester Seven

A moment of silence

for the weak and weary,whose path forward

rests just beyond our reach

yet hums softly in our heads,

a low vibration between thoughts,

pleading, whispering,

Look at me. We must keep going.

But our bodies stay still in time.

Our eyes cling to what’s familiar,

tears swelling, slow and private.

We look into the faces of friends

who will soon drift beyond our future,

yet remain beneath the same stars

that crown the college bar.

We wander home through quiet streets

and wonder what home even means.

It isn’t ours for long.

Already the night leans forward–

toward the jobs, the deadlines,

the gray routines waiting outside the gate.

The walls we once outgrew

still echo faintly with laughter.

The distance between then and now

shrinks and stretches in the same breath

as our college souls fade,

and our “adult” skin thickens by habit.

No more freedom of a Wednesday bagel run.

No more shrieks under disco lights.

No more of Boston’s puddles and broken umbrellas,

no more muffled library giggles,

or 2 a.m. fries that tasted like forever.

Why do I mourn a life still living?

When did this emptiness arrive?

Is it death I fear—

or the life that follows it?

What lies beyond these brick walls,

beyond the soft glow of campus light?

Why does it feel

as if life is slipping away

before it’s even begun?

---

It’s November now.

The air smells like paper and rain.

The trees are bare,

their shadows longer than their branches.

The sky turns violet too early,

as if the sun itself is tired.

Our laughter is quieter.

Not gone, but shivering.

We gather in smaller circles,

tucked into corners of bars,

speaking softly,

as if the world might overhear our leaving.

This is the hush of the senior reunion—

the slow fade of faces I once saw every day,

now appearing like ghosts

through the blur of passing weeks.

The world grows darker.

Friends retreat into themselves,

into warmth, into plans, into distance.

And I begin to understand

that next year’s air will feel colder

because it will hold fewer voices.

We toast to nothing,

to everything unnamed—

to the strange mercy of still being here

when so much is already gone.

Somewhere deep down,

beneath the noise,

a voice I almost recognize whispers:

You can’t take this with you.

And I know.

Because November is already taking it for me.

---

Still, I think this is what it means to live.

To feel the weight of something ending

and realize the weight is love.

We only grieve what we were lucky enough to have.

This sadness is proof.

Proof that these years existed,

that we existed,

that for a moment we touched something infinite.

In a year, I hope I’m still here—

not haunted,

but softer.

I hope I’ve learned to set the past down gently,

to start again,

like the freshman I once was,

open and unafraid.

Because to feel this much loss

means we had something worth keeping.

And I am grateful.

Grateful to hurt.

Grateful to have loved something, 

so deeply,

it refuses to fade.