Year 10 Lit Class

While learning about the pantoum poem structure - a pantoum is a poem composed of four-line stanzas in which the second and fourth lines of each stanza serve as the first and third lines of the next stanza -  10 Lit B digressed to talking about the current flu with its strange symptoms that have hit us all. We then decided to use the pantoum structure to write a class poem, as the repetition of the lines reminded us of the loop we are stuck in where it feels impossible to shake off this very unpleasant virus.

Bridget Costelloe - English and Literature Teacher

We were all very wrong.

Rooms empty, classes half full, not a footstep in the hallway, 

jumping from peer to peer; a cold that seems to never end.

Empty chairs, people missing in every room

Wondering where everyone is, the silence is deafening.

A cold that seems to never end, jumping from peer to peer. 

Teachers gone for days, it’s like they just disappear.

Where is everybody? The silence is deafening;

 my classmates sing silently with their mucus throats.

Students gone for days, it’s like they just disappear,

My head is splitting, my throat is dry like sandpaper, 

with their mucus throats, my classmates sing silently,

Every swallow is a sharper cut than the last.

My throat is dry like sandpaper, my head about to split 

If I haven’t been swimming, why are my ears blocked?

Every swallow cuts sharper than the last,

I feel like I am being suffocated, my circulation slowly stifled.

I haven’t been swimming, but my ears are always blocked, We thought the sickness was over, we were all very wrong, We feel like we are being suffocated, our circulation slowly stifled,

Rooms empty, classes half full, not a footstep in the hallway.

We thought the sickness was over, 

we were

all 

very

wrong.