Wants you to go back to bed, there’s no point in doing homework now. You need your rest.
Mixes robitussin and theraflu,
Stinky, steaming teas, suggests you salt water gargle.
Even though there’s no proof that the savoury soup Does anything, your mother passed it down to you, Just like hers did.
Makes chicken soup, from scratch,
In a stovetop cauldron filled with sweaty onions, and Silvery brown potatoes, blood orange carrots, and Black pepper.
Sick poem will brush your hair, and braid it, Rub the joints on your fingers made weary From all that typing.
She’s looking out for you,
She promises. She’ll wake you up If the world starts ending.
In the meantime, remember, No milk, extra water,
Feed the cold, starve the fever.
Don’t forget about her, when you get better, Remember how much work your body does for you, You push it back and forth like the tides,
Expecting it to return to you.
She keeps trying to explain: Some day, it won’t.
—Ananya Kumar-Banerjee is a junior in Berkeley College.
Illustration by Zihao Lin.