GRIEF Poem: THERE USED TO BE A WORLD OUT THERE, by Jodi Deadwood

I don’t remember my neighbors’ names anymore.
The family next door lives exactly thirty-five steps away,
Yet I have never knocked.
I think they have two sons, but I am not sure.
I have never seen them outside before.

I met Kaleb while working at an ice cream parlor last summer.
He would make me smile when my wrist hurt after scooping all day,
And we would go swimming in the ocean after our shift.
We hid our swimsuits all day under our red-striped uniforms.
I couldn’t look him in the eye after I found his Instagram,
And all of the pornstars he followed.

I remember walking into my first college class.
My parents had left me alone in an unfamiliar state on the other side of the country,
And I wanted to wear my favorite pair of cowboy boots that day.
My classmates wouldn’t listen to a word I said after they saw my shoes,
Even if they agreed with me.

I hate that it is more important to be efficient than human.
I hate that my friends do not write their essays.
I hate that they get the same grade that I do.
I hate that we eat perfectly plastic-wrapped poison.
I hate that my friends look at their phones when talking to me.
I hate that people care so much about suffering on the other side of the world,
But cross the street when they see a homeless man asking for a dollar,
But leave a sparrow with a broken wing to die alone in the rain.

Community is dying

And we are too lost in an algorithm to see it.

– Jodi Deadwood