Stoned In The Halls Of Stony Brook

Loss,
A word I know too much about.
I wake up and see the things left as debris around me,
Yet I’m blessed,
To have much more than many other people around a world cluttered by poverty and continuous war our emotions fuel daily…
But,
What I’ve lost is much deeper than that.
I lost myself.
And regained a new light to my darkness…

I remember the last time I encountered my former being.
I was in school,
Borough of Manhattan Community College of Tribeca,
Of all places.
Getting ready to graduate two and a half semesters in.
Increasing my grades into a row of A’s I’ve never seen before,
On a mission to be admitted into Stony Brook University.
And,
I was!

I achieved my goal,
But,
Was it a goal I personally wanted?
Not necessarily.
I just thought I had to just because America fools you into believing we “need” it
I mean,
There are so many people who’ve made it without an illustrious college to add into their resume.
Jay-z.
Kobe Bryant.
Leonardo DiCaprio.
Countless billionaires all across the world.
I don’t really need to keep going,
Right?
And,
Did I even want to go?
Was the question…

But,
I went on.
Accepted into Stony Brook University.
A beautiful escape that was part of a “Top 10 ugliest colleges” list I found in their own newspaper.
An experience so different from what I had envisioned it to be,
Hitting me like a tornado swooping me up from the highest mountain,
Driving me to levels of insanity I could never had imagined…

Away for the week,
Meant that I’ll be away from being with her,
Who I once thought of as my soulmate,
Whom I spent every single day with for 5 years without a single regret until that time was up,
My inner child had a hard time since she
was the only person who had ever understood him…

Never connected with anyone on campus.
A world of opportunities was at the palm of my hands,
And,
It was screwed up by each demon on my shoulders I had paid attention to during every test of Life itself…

To think that all I needed to maintain my scholarship,
A 2.5 GPA and enough acting skills to pretend I knew what I was doing.
With my scholarship being stripped from my veils of freedom,
I felt as of my windows of opportunity were glued shut by Hell Fires stirred by Satan himself…
As if,
He had my “number”…

Yet,
After all that,
I lay as a poet in my own right.
I mean,
It’s all I’ve had to keep me some sort of company.
Company with a companion,
Rather than a 9 to 5 tearing my entire spirit down to its,
Nakedness.
Now,
Instead of opening a textbook clouding my mind with lies and deceit,
To be what I am Not,
I open a journal.
Shining light providing warmth to a soul who had gone cold for so,
So long…