It’s caught up, always, in those little things:
street corners, half-familiar: shop facades:
it’s not so much expansive boulevards
as rain-worn roofs which pluck the silvery strings
of sorrow. Part of my subconscious clings
to remnants – ruined fragments, broken sherds.
They say the brain’s an organ which discards,
not hoards. Why, then, these cruel rememberings?
A tranquil helmsman, plotting perfect vectors,
is how I see myself. Wretched delusion!
We’re buffeted by failure and exclusion,
divided into Hectors or defectors.
The only shred of dignity it brings
is when we learn to love our sunderings.
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 defectors, I pity those defectors, 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?
Any state's electors
May now be defectors
A state may go for Trump
But its electors can choose 'her'
A recipe for chaos, pure
To be challenged in court, for sure
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