At first it feels like freshman year
Maybe it was
Everything is new
I actually want to be here
I can see my future clearly
I can see myself popular
I can see the improvements I want to make
I can see it all.
Then it twists a little bit
Nothing changes.
We all know each other with the few exceptions
I care a lot
Suddenly looking at GPA’s feels more real
Then I meet the boy
We have our moments
Like a flash of lightening it is over.
I feel the heart love
I feel it break
Physically though this is not a lie.
It takes a good 6 months to mend the pain
Long months
With best friends there too
Lots of chocolate
Busying myself.
Then my heart can’t possibly feel hurt anymore
There’s too much stress
ACT Scores and GPA’s
Nothing else defines me but what I am on paper
A number
The higher it gets the better person I am
The better life I will have
The better chance I will be
Something.
That’s all anyone wants
That is why we are put through this
They know what it does to us
Our shoulders go from being weighed down by backpacks
To the feeling of stress that won’t go away.
I need answers
What is going to happen to me.
The next boy comes
The heartbreak doesn’t hurt as much this time
Probably because I forgot how to feel
All my mind seems to focus on is that light
It is the end of junior year and I need to rest
My mind hates me
Asks me when it can stop
Thinking
Testing
I don’t know what to say
The bell rings and summer begins
We all let loose
As much as we can anyway
We are no fools
Senior year will begin shortly
That break everyone was talking about
Yeah that is months away
And if you really think about it
It doesn’t exist
We tell ourselves it does so maybe the stress will hurt less
Lying to ourselves has become a pattern now
No one seems to care
Not even the one person we stare at in the mirror
I miss her
I miss that girl who was so excited
She didn’t know what the four years would bring her
She was carefree
She knew what she wanted
She wanted a good time.
I am sorry I disappointed her.
These four years took me for a turn
Suddenly it is almost the end
Almost the finish
It is all supposed to wind down
I am sitting here begging for more
Sorry I complained
I want to stay safe in these walls
I want to play this game.
Whatever scares me in here
Is better than what I can imagine barks out there
It is calling
They call it the future.
Decide
Decide now they all say
The finish line is almost here
We need your signature
Your money
Your mind
Tell us now they say.
You have this many choices
Make the wrong one and you’re done.
This determines your life
Stop looking back at that little girl freshmen year
She was naïve
That girl is you
She is stronger but looking for answers to.
Time to stop listening to the guidance
That means nothing now.
All I have is me
All you have is you.
Listen to yourself
Your mind is telling you something
Please listen up.
Time’s Up
Finish now.