On a wooden shelf textbook waits
Harboring facts, knowledge, dates
Each year summer brings needed rest
After each final, each test.

But summer is gone and school has begun
So away with freedom, the warmth of the sun
To a teenage girl, textbook goes
What horrors await? Textbook doesn't know.

Hurled in a locker, metal slams
Smothered by a shirt that says "Go Rams!"
Shoved in a backpack, do not suffocate?
Can't miss the school bus, hurry, don't be late!

Scribbled and doodled on, "It tickles!" It screams
But teenage girl doesn't realize silence is not what it seems
Spilled soda burns; acid sweet
Bubbling suffering unimaginable heat

Left on a desk, a window so close
Pages now stick, it is so gross
With its strength the textbook flies
It has just commited suicide.

Bland colours on the walls reflect our hearts.
Cold drafts in the empty hallways inspire doubt in our already clouded minds.
       A stream of words, uninterrupted through the weeks and months, never ceasing,
        breaks even the strongest discipline.

Droning, numbing, abrading away all thought or whim, melding perfection,
           that may never come, that will never fully avail itself upon the collective senses
            Of the plenitude of “students” living and working between these walls.
The walls painted a uniform eggshell, urging to stay in the incubator.

The door stands as a gateway to another, brighter, complete, world.
              The door, though with hinges easily opened, and a threshold easily crossed,
               Has been lifted to a height unattainable to those who work alone, or in dissidence with others.
                It stands as a gateway, but the way has never been as arduous, nor as complicated, quite as now.

I'm in class
doodling-
instead of paying attention-
doodling instead of listening.

I'm just hearing
the mumbling
of the professor...
professor-ing.

he's talk talk talking about...
something.
Doing something
because of something.

But I’m just doodling.
Again not listening.
Again not hearing
Such important details

Of something
Happening somewhere
Because of...
Something

Something bad is happening
Again
Sounds like something that’s happened
Before

I continue to doodle
adding tornados to the scribbles.
Causing mayhem between
Simple blue lines on bleached paper

Just like somewhere
Where something happened
Because of...
Something

Concentrate-
Harder like the pressure of the pen
I doodle with
It’s too late

Lecture over.

A student weary from the week cries out, it's like
"We're trying to one up each other in misery"
Day by day,
Every single one, lines up straight, and rigid
Takes the time to confess and lays down
What's going on, around in this town?
The culture that is spreading is toxic.
Similar to a disease, where is our CDC?
Who is supposed to protect my life from me?
From my destructive, wasteful ways
From those long and uninterrupted days
Why do the teens have less and less life jumping between their minds?
Less and less excitement found in their blurry far too tired eyes
Dull, dreary, and exhausted
Walking into here feels like pushing against an immortal force
We trudge through the mud afraid of what comes next
I'm wondering if the girl next to me knows.
If she believes that the way we're going leads to the cold
To the undeserving, to those that remain untold.
I wonder and wonder for hours, but it's in my mind and I know.
This life style that is so widely encouraged and yet also frowned upon.
The controversy sets up success almost as a paradox.
Impossible, not achievable at least in this reality.
Should I sacrifice my health for a good grade in a class I don't even like.
Education, the path to freedom, but it feels as if living our lives in a hell.
Consuming coffee with enough sugar to make heart spike far above normal and to pump my adrenaline.  to get me going
My heartbeat is pumping too loud for me to hear.
“I despise where I am,”
the repetition of my statement is nauseating
I mean I do what I can, but it seems to never be enough.
And yet so many of us find ourselves relating
Why would students today rather die that go to school this way?
Why would I rather stay home sick just to avoid the stress?
How do you change our system, our very broken system that is no where near the best.
I don't know how to fix the problem, if I even can.
May, the time of finalities, whether it be exams, projects, or tests.
A performance scheduled during AP week, what a brilliant idea
Why don’t you just sign the forms to drive the students completely mad.
I'm not good with time management.
I’m not good at taking math tests or test in general that is.
So why have I taken 5 standardized in this week alone.
That seems a bit absurd.
We’re giving it our all, I promise.
Please give us a break, please let’s change the mentality
The toxicity of the prepatory student mindset
If not for me, or my fellow students, for the future.
Please the pressure is capsizing our success,
And our SOS doesn’t seem to be getting through
So I hope this message reaches you.

this is an endless hellscape
housed by demons mocking my torture
blood rains from my fingertips
clotting in the gaping mouths
of the spectators' bellow
my bones snap and mend at crooked angles
set by my captor
injecting formaldehyde to freeze my body
poisoned by exposure

Chalk is the symbol of life
which says our body is
just a dust at the end.
I am remembering my
school days with my friend.
The chalk in our hand
to act like a teacher in the front
of my class - Finally to the
principal's room we were sent.
The time I spent
with the chalk piece is an imprint
in my special moments of my life.
Life is like a chalk piece
The mistakes are the dust
To be dusted and the dust
Can also be transformed
Into  a new chalk with a
Lesson from the old.