My sweater
Location
I have this sweater
that I hang on the wall
it is not to clothed me
but to remind me
of something I’d hope to achieve
if I didn’t give up trying.
This is a NYU sweater
the sweater of my dream school
I’ve always wanted to go there
Alas, I never applied there
I was always afraid
that I wasn’t good enough.
My counselor gave me a list
of schools that she picked
I applied to these schools
although I had no interest in
I blindly followed
what my counselor said.
Getting accepted to these schools
was not what I’d expected
it brought out bigger questions
the questions of “what if”
what if I applied to NYU?
what if I was accepted?
Living 13 miles from the Village*
I travelled down every week
my favorite cafes were there
I even visited NYU several times
The more I visited, the more I fell in love
Why do I always want things that I cannot have?
That feeling of never knowing
outweighed my chance of rejection
it made me realize that it’s worth a try
so I made my decision to transfer
If I did well academically, I’d have a fair shot
after all, a good GPA is usually a deal-breaker.
Sacrifices had to be made
No Xbox, no video games
textbooks and online tutorials came to my aid
and then came my finals
months of hard work and studying
I believed I was prepared.
Now you’ll be expecting
that this story has a happy ending
but no, I screwed up during finals
and now my GPA’s below a 3
my dreams of transferring, gone down the drain.
I’ve no one to blame but myself
I could use the excuse of being a foreign student
far from home, struggling with the culture shock
or I could explain the call I received, a week before my finals
the night I found out, that my mom has cancer
but that doesn’t solve anything- my GPA remains the same.
My story ends there, just like that
don’t expect a moral or a lesson learned
‘cos that’s just life
twisted and unexpected, like a double edge-blade
allowing us to dream the impossible
but killing it when reality sets in.
* the Village is more commonly referred as Greenwich Village, a neighborhood in New York City. It is also the neighborhood to New York University (NYU).