My average means I don’t have to take final exams.
So my bachelor's degree is a finished product.
I cranked it out, all that’s left now is the walk (May 18th).
Let’s call it my nearly forgotten masterpiece.
My schedule says that I start a 1-year ‘master of public health’ degree in 38 days.

It was my mom’s idea. She said, “You need to keep active” (pre- med-school).
It sounds crazier to me now than it did last year, when I was accepted and agreed.
Now, I feel like some chary, aging showgirl who’s about to be hustled back on-stage.
But what’s life without massive compromise?
Anyway, don’t cry for me. I’m still sizing it all up, I’ll figure it out.

I suppose we’re all out there hustling.
It’s our response to slowing med-school admissions,
those glitches in the medical, industrial education complex
or that’s how the narrative’s shaped, anyway.
It’s not the additional work that bothers me, I’m regular worker bee,

It’s the perma-threat of loneliness.
I’m already packing. Leaving feels real
and I'm surfing this maudlin wave tonight—shading deep blue.
The simple march of time will take away friends I’ve grown to love.
We’ve allegorised and transformed one another by proximity.

I’ve really loved it here.
.
.
Songs for this:
Graduation (Friends Forever) by Vitamin C
Graduation Day by Tony Rivers & The Castaways

It is with bonecrushing sadness
that i report the
     Loss.
The Life destroying
dangle on the
     rope
God provided.

Almost is a hateful
word.
Almost is the
rip on the
     Stick
of Hope.

What now do you want to
     Know?
The War served by the
     Friends of Allah
Praise to His name.

The escape to the West
     failed.
The Earthquake finished
    Our completeness
from happening.

Your Dream became
your

Ticket to Hell

And mine to the
Unmade bed
     empty of Time
and Pleasure

To the Days of our
     Lives
Never to be

Led.


Caroline Shank
April 23, 2025

You praise the petals — bright, unbruised,
not knowing how the roots once lost their way.
I showed you one, still tangled,
and you turned your gaze — ashamed for me.

Must I always blossom,
always shine like stained-glass grace?
Is the wilt too wild,
too human for your taste?

I crave the chaos —
a glass too full, a night too loud,
a choice I’ll hate come morning,
but one that made me real somehow.

Time slips like wine down linen,
and sorrow is too thick to sip alone.
I want to dance where halos melt,
where saints forget their tone.

Let me live,
not just in your curated light —
but in the aching, messy dusk
where even rebels feel alright.

Will that steal my petals’ worth?
Or prove they bloomed despite the dirt?

it's April in the lilac's sweetness
I need a break from this modern mind,
from  the chronic, endemic discourse of crisis
I am looking: this creature, the sea, is herself
the wind shouts without words
echoes pass through the gate of tears,
weapons of mass production
take my hands and do something with them
layers of silence or the tango of closeness,
the thought of an uniterrupted line