four years of college, in ten acts

18 May, 2026

Content warning: Suicidal ideation

now that i've graduated, here's a poetic retelling of my college experience, told in ten acts. These poems are meant to be read together, sequentially as a cohesive work, though for convenience I have added a table of contents and individually linked poems here.¹

click the footnote, and then select the act you'd like to jump to. Alternatively, each poem is it's own page which can be accessed by the link in the footnotes, or through the poetry section.

My freshman year: Act I
My sophomore year and following summer: Acts II, III, and IV
My junior year and the following summer: Acts V, VI, and VII
My senior year and graduation: Acts VII, VIII, IX, and X

Act ¹, Lemon Hall

i got accepted
and i figured, i needed
to take my chances
go south, far from
my family's grasp

they dropped me off
and set up my stuff
had good food
and argued like we
somehow always managed to

moving in,
so happy to be free
i did not miss my old life
ready to start anew
who comes here, belongs here

and for the first time in
my life at that point
i believed it
and i really did belong
though it took some time

to find my friends
that would define this chapter
of my life
where i learned that time flies
when you're having fun

the first year of my college experience
spent in a nice dorm with AC
studying, reading, and watching House, M.D.
while eating cheese cubes at my desk
just doing what i needed to do

i started hormones that year
because i was finally free to
and it was a new chapter in my
life, a clean break from old habits
painting my nails and catching fish

and then it ended
my family came back down
to help me move all my shit
into a storage locker
arguments resumed

and i left, not having grown
attached, still deluding myself
with the idea that i'd still
go and be a medical doctor
which would make my parents happy

and then maybe i would be happy.

Act ², 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

Act ³, Non-reciprocal Love Story

i met her then.
broken in body and spirit
and she was so...
just so much all at once
she was fucked up too

and i didn't fucking care
maybe a half dozen dates tops
i realized that
i could fall in love
so naturally, i did

and in the midst of
my mold-induced agony
i would latch on
warmth, shape, form
together in my room

and then in hers
we had tea
chatted
got fucked up
and then it was

an euphoric blur
that i simply
could not forget
as i walked home
that warm spring night

fuck.
i really did love her
so it hurt all the more
when she told me
she was getting back together

with her ex
and that was it.
we never had a 3rd time
toghether
and i was left

heartbroken, for the first time
in my life
and when combined with the pain
from the mold
i simply just... broke.

my labor and love, unrequited

Act ⁴, Sidequest

my research ground to a halt
i blamed myself
but i found that nobody could
get it to work
even the best and brightest of

my lab group.
and in hindsight it
kinda made sense
but i had not internalized
that science was collaborative

and i was the lone wolf
so isolated from
everything and everyone
until the summer
and sidequest

that changed my life
a domino-effect
which started with a hexanes shortage
so the department chair told
my PI

who told me
to set up a still
and do research
on reclaiming
waste eluents

i became an
analytical chemist
that summer
developing methods
tinkering with the gas chromatograph (GC)

my little sidequest was
not spent alone
science is collaborative
and i spent lab meetings
dodging questions from the

other PI in the research group
the organic lab that had
all the nicest things
and their students were
superstars

and i had a crush on
the blond-haired girl with tired eyes
who went to Harvard
but i woudn't tell her, or
anyone, since i was busy

building a contraption
an incredibly efficient still
and still recovering
from the mold poisoning and my heartbreak
locked in on the side quest

no more organic research
i wanted to work with instrumentation
and i was afraid to talk with
the instrument director
about my GC troubles

by the end of the summer
i had reclaimed 40 liters
of eluents, saving thousands of
dollars, and realizing
that i could just...

switch fields
a life-changing decision
and one that would
set up my path forward
as a technician

I ended the summer, excited for the year ahead. I was not ready.

Act ⁵, PChem

physical chemistry
is a subject that many
chem majors dread.
because it's the intersection
rigorous mathematics

with observational evidence
and somewhere on that bleeding edge
several pioneers of the field
would take their own lives
so one must tread carefully

Quantum mechanics was fine.
not great, not terrible, and
I ended with an A-
which was good enough
for me.

Taken simultaneously with instrumental analysis
it was fun, although quite stressful
i was in the zone, and intensely focused
i understood what was happening
and i was looking forward

to the next semester
Physical Chemistry II: Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics
and Physical Chemistry Laboratory
alongside inorganic chemistry
i was not ready for the storm ahead

at some point i started to fall apart
i stopped showing up to class
pulled one-too-many all-nighters
and fell into a deep melancholy
that would utterly destroy me.

i did so well in inorganic chemistry
until it all collapsed
and that's when i realized
i couldn't be the academic weapon
i wanted to be, and i would have

to settle for less.
but less is still more than none.
i couldn't dig my way out of this hole
and find gold at the same time
all of this happening

while i was in physical agony still
recovering from my back injury
and residual mold poisoning
so miserable i longed for death
and began to slowly rot away

i held it together
only barely
standing on the knife's edge
the last i felt this way
was from severe, untreated dysphoria

i was going to lose it all
only held together by
my technican job (and subsequent paycheck)
my class about scientific discoveries
and the hope of night vision

waiting for me in the long quiet
so i chose to live.
i ignored the cyanide bottle
and pushed forward
one day at a time

everything was falling apart
i couldn't see the next day,
much less a future
i tortured my lab partner
with panicked calls at 3 AM

asking for data
and making shit up
somehow getting an A in
PChem lab, entirely
undeserved.

but I made it out alive.

Act ⁶, The Long Quiet

there's a stillness
it lingers in the air
after its all over.

an eerie feeling
of deep isolation

the sun rises after heavy rain.
birds singing, blue skies, and
i suppose i should be glad that
i've made it through

alive, and dubiously well

the long quiet after the storm passes
stepping back from the knife edge
i realize that all of this meant
very little in the grand scheme of things

and i was right! i made it in spite of it

all the anguish over what?
was I so weak as to break down over something so trivial?
or perhaps it wasn't so trivial after all.
maybe it was worth the pain.

to live though that experience

the stillness is unsettling.
no voices, no sounds, no thoughts.
only a quiet fatigue, settling over
one's broken body and mind
as withdrawal from both stimulants and society kicks in

all the more relevant
from there, it was quiet
uncomfortable
but quiet nonetheless
i had survived this far

better uncomfortable
but i had my first
night vision device
to bring me joy
and kept my head above

the floodwaters
my wounds would heal
albeit with time
and in the silence
i found peace

fleeting, and ephemeral
but peace nonetheless
a brief moment to myself
before i filled my life
with noise again

im glad i stayed for the long quiet

Act ⁷, Interlude

alive, and healing.
working through my thesis
project, at my own relaxed pace
i probably could've worked
a whole bunch more

but i needed space
and time
to slowly recover
both physically
and mentally

summer nights spent
staring at the stars
hiking in the woods
and biking around town
under the near-infrared starlight

making good food at home
watching garbage on my television
monday lab meetings
wednesday chem department ice cream
friday lab lunches

chatting and helping out
both my lab, and the other
lab group over
the summer
belonging, in the lab community

no sidequests
just a good time
all around
sketching out concepts
and chewing on my thesis project

and as summer turned to fall
i keept up more of the same
same activities
same relaxed pace
spending my days hard at work

and my nights quiet
dinner with my lab friends
where we grew close over
taco bell
and texas roadhouse

i talked with her again
clinging onto a little resentment maybe things would be okay
even if it couldn't work out
we could still be friends.

a slow and steady work pace
punctuated by the crunch
of graduate school applications
falling in love again
yet tired all the same

hopeful, i reached out
into the world
thinking i had a decent
(ish)
shot at grad school

or maybe not
my sidequest got
worked into my essays
and my poetry began to take form
as i wrote more and more

winter break came and went
as did the first half of my last
semester of college
making good progress on my thesis project
though i had yet to lay a word on a page

for once, things were good!
the semester came and went
learning, working, and for the first time
since physical chemistry,
living.

time flies when you're having fun

Act ⁸, Thesis

an act in five parts
starting after
spring break
which broke me again
and im still recovering

cigarettes
insomnia
heartbreak
exhaustion
catharsis

a month and a half of
full bore effort
i had to drop hours
balancing three electives
and my ever-growing project

i picked up cigarette smoking
the bliss caught me at a good
time, and i felt that
maybe, just maybe
things would be alright

then came the insomnia
too many stimulants,
too much work to do
too little time to do it
and so i lost the ability to sleep

catching feelings for her
crying hysterically over
a woman i could never be with
because she, and i
were both taken

worked to utter exhaustion
days in class and work
nights spent trying to unwind
and coming into lab past midnight
to watch the sun rise alongside my results

89 pages.
fourteen thousand words
and on a friday afternoon
i submitted my thesis to my committee
and i was freed

defending my thesis
went absolutely stellar
i did not spend all this time
to be unprepared
mastery over my field

i became the subject matter
expert for an ultraniche
piece of instrumentation
that separated chemicals
a culmination of 2 years of R&D

i passed my thesis defense
then the last day of classes
came and went by so i
submitted my thesis online
on the seventh of may

and that was it.
no fanfare, no triumph.
not even catharsis
on a random thursday
it was over, just like that

only one thing left now.

Act ⁹, Graduation

i bought myself a white dress
that i knew i could never wear
because my father would probably
...
it certainly would get ugly

i took the real grad pictures with my
closest lab friends
with the cords I dyed myself
made of nylon mooring line
wearing our regalia

memories made as Kathryn
with those who called me by my name
i was happy and excited then
celebrating our achievements together
we looked good together

i made the effort
to arrange the chem department
to deadname me
the faculty brought it up in their meetings
for my own safety

but it hurt so bad
i hated every moment of it
first to walk
to a name that wasn't mine
i hugged my PI and the deparment chair

because i would've started bawling
if i was denied even that
forcably dissociating
so i could keep my composure
but with each name they read

i weep
knowing that i had spent four
years, finding a true self
only to discard it just like that
for my own safety

i wanted to be pretty
wear my white dress
hear my name as it was meant to be
and it just hurt
in a way i haven't felt since high school

wearing a ridiculous outfit
that i bought from goodwill
since i didn't have any formal
male clothes
and i needed to look presentable

i cheered for my friends
and i got my placeholder diploma
in the reception afterwards
i chatted with my professors
and said my goodbyes

"your son"
"he, him his"
i just wanted to wither away
i couldn't celebrate like this
and on a sunny, saturday evening

that was it. I made it.
four years ago in high school
i could have never imagined
graduating magna cum laude, departmental honors
and getting into a PhD program

much less living to see it.
so i made it out
alive
dubiously well
and it was over

no fancy dinner
just, packed all my shit
into my father's car
and we drove back home
into a longer quiet

i weep again

Act ¹⁰, The Longer Quiet

there really is a stillness
after it ends
it's so surreal
where one random friday
it just ends

after i submitted my last
take-home final exam, i
smoked my last cigarette
and tried to enjoy my last week
of college

working, and playing
and sleeping, and eating
having a good time
with all my friends
before it all ended

the goodbyes were just
that. quick, and abrupt
a tight hug, a "see ya later"
and then i was gone.
home again.

four years later.
so much has changed
yet so little
those four years... felt so long to me

and i wept again
a deep melancholy
that i had not felt
since PChem
welling up inside

no friends
no noise
just a longer quiet
at home
with nothing to do

hating myself
yearning for intoxication
lobotomize myself
so i don't have to feel
anymore

so tired but i can't rest
im glad i made it
but i wish i could stay
just a bit longer
than i did

i was free at college
who comes here, belongs here
and i don't belong at home
memories swirling
and i was just so out of it

locked up again
like i was before
not knowing where i'd go
beyond vague promises
and i can't see the future

softly weeping as i write this poem