My heart yearns for a simpler time

one of fairy tales, of scuffed knees, of random giggle fits.

I sit staring at a page of meaningless text

surrounded by towers of textbooks

and students too buzzed up on coffee to focus.

I hope to absorb the information on the page,

like that osmosis thing we learned about in middle school,

but the brain does not work that way.

So my expression stays fixed,

stays empty.

My hand holds the pen to the paper,

poised to write,

yet there is no movement

no flow of words.

My mind jumps from the assignment at hand

to the one due next week,

then to the coffee that I don't need but desperately crave.

My to-do list seems never ending

and despite the fact that it's not on my nifty list,

all I want to do is sleep.

But there is no rest for my kind,

only papers,

only grades,

only an endless stream of assignments and requirements.

It's finals week here on campus

and every minute is both an eternity

and a split second.

Everyone has discovered the library,

though they don't fully understand the concept.

Chatter dances through the air,

derailing trains of thought,

disrupting work we don't really want to do.

I've been here for five minutes,

or five hours.

The sun has finally set,

along with my motivation

and yet again

my heart yearns for a simpler time.