Classes started up again today. Soon, we’ll be gloriously stressed, and clocked-up on whatever. Our hearts will swell to the pre-med symphony - a frantic opus, composed in the key of no sleep.

In seminars for rising pre-med seniors, (What's needed to get that med-school slot!), it’s obvious that 60% of the students who started out with us, on this track, are gone - left for other majors.
“I wasn’t happy, it was too much,” they said.

I feel a pang when I hear that undergrads we’ve shared a trench with have switched their major to basket weaving (political science), TikTok (computer science) or Phys-Ed.

I envy those deserters, I pity those deserters, I envy.. Wait, aren’t deserters supposed to be, well, you know.

Meanwhile, the rest of us, the stubborn few, cling to the dream. It’s a waking dream, for caffeinated zombies, obsessive-compulsive workaholics and maladjusted wonks who neglect personal needs, relationships and in some cases personal hygiene (not me, of course) in favor of a goal.

Maybe there’s something wrong with us?

Sinking in silence,
My breath is shallow.
Mind is rapid
Yet still so hollow.
'Let it pass'
They say,
Thoughts will subside.
But mine continue
To haunt me inside.
My body is tired,
Brain on fire.
As pressures of life
Raise much higher.

The darkness holds desires
Through life is always there
Presence that never expires
Can always feel his stare

Waiting to take happiness
Step off a ledge to get away
That only brings me more stress
I struggle every day

The sharpened mind - with care - takes aim
- at university, we play ruthless games.
Where pencils scratch, their graphite gray,
and scholarly answers take the day.

I've finished midterms!
It was like one of those TV shows, ‘survivor’ or something.

Enzyme kinetics, metabolic pathways, protein structures and functions be ****** - no, be double ******.

I’d been working problems raw in dreams, waking up tired.

Sunday, I was so stressed I'd felt calm, like I’d accepted my fate.
I can tell you that now - now that I survived.

“I was strazzled but controlled - there's a difference in how
I struggle internally - and what I let show.” I told Leong.
“Is that why you were yelling at everyone?” she replied.

“Now that midterms are over, I feel luminary,” I informed Leong, “am I glowing?”
She looked up and said, “No.” Communists aren’t sentimental.
Of course I meant luminary in both achievement and radiance.

My Uncle Remy used to tell me:
“Little one, don’t worry about being a failure,
that’s your parent’s job.”

I Love you Uncle Remy.

You can only spend so many hours in labs, study groups and classrooms - under relentless, fluorescent lighting - before you start feeling life withdrawal.

When I hit that stresshold, I need to rebalance myself.

I could go to the New Haven harbor - I find the ocean endlessly relaxing - or for a quick fix, I can always rely on the warmth of multicolored product packaging.

For the last one, a grocery store will do. I’ll walk the bright, prismatic cereal aisle, and run my finger gently along the gratuitous, rainbowed variety of selections.

It’s a soothing gesture that I repeat several times. A reminder that there are still beautiful, shiny things out there, on demand, in the uncomplicated, non-academic world.

a tear dropped
from the face of despair
and wove it’s way down
it’s entangled hair
weaving through waves
of dry dead strands
it untangled the knots
the braids and the bands
sliding ever so slowly
soothing out like oil
every curve and curl
of every anxious coil
straightening the stress
as it falls to the ground
shaking your head off the mess
let your hair hang down

We wake up to that alarming sound,
Pick up the cellphone

Scroll, Scroll, Scroll
Unread messages, missed calls

The darkness and lonesome of waking up,
Covered, Isolated,
but recharged from the constant stimulus
and daily overload of the senses.

Eyes feel weighted,
Stretching open as if rubber bands hold them shut.

The sound of TVs, Music, Cars,
Technology
Dressing well, presentation is key.

The anxiety of fulfilling plans, responding to emails, presenting your body to wherever it needs to be.  

Enslaved by the concept of time,
the necessary effort to find time for you,
but the feeling of losing, and the learned mentality that tells you to be lazy is to sit.  

In this quiet realm,
listening to ones own thoughts and wondering:
how many of these are a result of influence?  

Where am I?  
Where is me?

Everyday we wear this armor,
ready to battle,
but seeking
peace,
tranquility.

When was the last time you noticed the birds chirp?
The patterns of wind, as is winds up,
and as it winds down.  
As it quiets down enough to hear a pen drop,
and then it leaves you for a moment.
The cold as it triggers goosebumps and lifts the hair on your arms.

The annoyance of grass,
irritating your bare skin as you sit on it,
but you choose tolerance.  

And all of this provokes the realization,
of the constant loop you are in.  
To get here you have to escape.

The expectations of each one of your roles,
Son or Daughter, Man or Woman, Friend or Foe, to choose you or someone else,
Human.
The appoinments of life,
the need to insistingly value your time,
the sin of escaping your daily routine.

Days like these

A machine constantly in motion

To be the free bird that fights for survival,
where a meal is never guaranteed.
Or to be caged,
and fed by the social constructs,
and partake of what is given to you.  

Either way,
A loop is a loop.

there comes a slow, soft afternoon pace and a dinner bell
i sweat, jogging, to the table,
soaked with the cherry blood red fruit of my labor.
when my meal is served,
there’s grease in the pan
and my hands are black as coal,
so it lathers my throat and turns sore.
unfixable bellyaches and frequent *****.
my hairbrush combs knots of dead hair, clumps in my fists
and the mother is a cross old women,
apathetic and unforgiving
she touches with a stonewall embrace
she tells me i am worth something,
and then she tells me i am not
as i scrub the dirt from every single step she takes
and wash my entire mouth with soap after every word that i slip up and say.

yet there is a place inside the trees
where there are fawns and fairies and peacemakers
and the meadow sings almost humanly
with a beautiful flute and a distant harp
and that is where the light is the brightest.
there are no cold, empty corners
hidden by the dusty rust of time
there are only staircases leading to the sky
and bounding rabbits and seashells nowhere near the sea,

but in this house,
the cruel and unforgiving mother
owns me
and i cannot fathom escape  
in this fit of naivety.