alarm screeches at 7:30am
until slammed against the wall and silenced
but you're then awoken by the cold-sweat panic
coupled with 8am realization
that you were supposed to head to class
ten minutes ago
and with sweatpants and slippers on
you sprint into thirty degrees
fog in the air, fog on your glasses
what a way to start the day!
philosophy *****, but you can't even sleep
hair matted and face oily
you sit there and scribble
every minute passing by slower
making you angrier
and the walk back to isolation
makes your blood boil
so you splash water to get rid of the oil
but now that you're back in a dark and cold room
it's time to hop on to your class on zoom!
you are paying thousands
thousands of dollars
THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS
to group facetime your professor
and spend half the time
experiencing wifi interruptions
and roommate disruptions
and near-screaming eruptions
but then you're done.
but not really!
you have a three-hour lab
and no time to eat before
so your meal is trail mix
and you feel weak and sick
but you have to get through
your gpa is dependent upon
mixing these chemicals correctly
so much depends
upon
a red hot
face
glazed with tear
water
beside the white
lab coats
welcome to your life!
this is what you wanted,
right?
this was your dream?
but your "dream"
has been twisted
and wrung out
of its golden magic
a watered down version
of what you expected
you knew it would be different
you thought maybe a third
would be skimmed off
but, hey, lucky you!
it's not even half full
welcome to your nightmare!
i hope you had a fun day
because now you get to slave
over hours of work
staring at a blue screen
icons melting your eyes
emails ruining your life
all you know in the late hours
is wooden chairs
and agony
so return "home"
tiptoe in the dark
because this is not your place
sharing is caring
spend the next three hours
tossing and turning
because you get to wake up
and do it all over again!
if your life has gone flat
at least you know what to expect
if you can no longer be surprised
can you be pained?
i would say i'm sorry
but you chose this
so kick yourself
put on your mask
and shut up.
this is your fault.
this is your life,
get used to it.