Malfunctioning

We are

day-to-day here, surviving off

               coffee and energy drinks

and herbal teas passed like drugs

beneath the lunch table.

               Like cigarettes

               in a jailyard.

The future doesn’t

               extend

past the week’s exams;

countless piles

of papers abound and oh,

the mile-long lists of

‘things to do’

               we’ve incorporated

           into our skin.

We are bursting

with knowledge,

but sometimes it seems

like we’re trying to forget

and be ourselves again:

               the people we were

         before the caffeine addictions

               and the neurotic breakdowns

that always land so nicely

on our busiest days.

We’re malfunctioning,

rusting over—

not from time, but

from use, and the world

sees us as children:        inexperienced,

 immature,

in need of direction.

Yet here we are,

pretending to be adults.