Tanner Lux wrote this poem using the emails, texts, and remembered snippets of conversations of Jim Thorpe Area High School’s Class of 2021.

– A Note from the Editor

It’s time for us to pack our things.

I’m taking what memories I can.

I should have the baggage to fit it all:

• I’m taking chewy Spree candies; 
• the school parking lot in fall;
• car rides with windows down;
• the football games;
• the band brigade;
• the Chinese restaurant in town;
• the theater and its warm stage; 
• and the weight lifting room, with its shoddy Powerade vending machine.

I’ll take the pain as well, 

As lessons in my head. 

But I won’t forget the love I saw, 

Even when I’m dead. 

I want to take the colors:

• Mr. Miller’s face red; 
• bashful blue stripes on the walls; 
• and white fluorescent lights that coat the halls.

I want to take my failed tests

(Thanks a lot, Mr. E.). 

I’m sorry we all can’t be like Danny…

Now I go forth into the world, 

an Olympian carrying a mighty torch! 

But part of me will always be

a kid from Jim Thorpe.

All the best!

-Tanner