Act II: Mold
once again my parents moved me in
arguments and goodbyes
crammed into a crummy motel room
which seemed nice
until it became a brick prison
i started off strong
but it just got worse
a back injury over the summer
would progressively worsen
and then the pain began
or rather, gotten far worse
unbearable to the point of
desparation, trying anything
not helped by cramming in all
the pre-med classes
and i realized that i had
no love for biology
nor any further interest
in the pre-med grind
falling in love with chemistry
not just as a placeholder major
but as a field that i would
absolutely obsess over
so excited to do lab work
i got sloppy and left the lab a mess
angering my PI (academic supervisor)
the one professor in the chem department
who was never seen to be visibly upset
twice.
and so i learned a hard lesson
the pain kept getting worse
and i couldn't think
spent so many times
that semester, twitching
on my bathroom floor in
a drug-induced haze
i couldn't get out of bed
and my grades started to slip
black mold.
growing in the AC
and all over the room
i thought nothing of it
but in hindsight
it was to blame
for severe debilitating pain
that im still recovering from
nearly two years later
so i was happy to move
out of that moldy
motel room
i did it with a friend
and when i cleaned up my room
for the last time on a spring
morning, i realized
that i wasn't a kid anymore
i moved out without my parent's help
and as the halfway-point of
my college experince concluded,
i had finally come of age
as i boarded the train and left
and i didn't look back