“Despite the potential for a mass outbreak looming over our heads, Josephine Butler students, and Durham students writ large, have shown a true resilience and a fighting spirit.” Jessica Pabon, a Butlerite fresher, discusses lockdown anxieties, homesickness and enjoying university life during a pandemic.
What have those watery globes in industrial goggles seen?Frozen lakes, dance halls, unexpectedGoodbyes, I’m sure. Locked vaults of anaesthetic and no Combination. You’ve trapped me in those unbroken Codes. I know you want to forget,But every mispronunciation Reminds me of what I’m lacking. A name with no recollection;A name with no language. You’re no angel just a vulnerable Old man broken by his past. And that breaks Me. I’ve been mourning my history Since before I was born. You deserve memorial But, how can I remember you when you won’t let me?
I have a memory of you, one that can never be corrupted by the passage of time. It was in a garden in June. There you lay in this expanse of green, this garden of ours. You had collapsed by a rose bush, the blushing petals of one low- lying flower rested upon your cheek. You looked at me, lying beside you, eye to eye, nose to nose and you grinned at me. You closed your eyes. I admired you, all of you; the soft line your lashes form, the curve of your dark pink lips, the light you…
“It’s locked.” “No it’s not.” “I’m telling you it is!” “Let me try.” I stand, brush past her purposely, take the yellow door handle with both of my deceptively strong arms and pull. Yank. Pathetically lurch and heave. It’s locked. “Shit.” “I told you.” I hate that she can say that, “Is this a joke? Did you do this?” She stops. Her amused face goes dead pan and bitter right in front of me, “Wow Em.” I falter. Moron. It’s always the phrases I don’t filter that go on to sting. Normally when I manage to damage a conversation, I’ll…