PERPLEXED

I wake from the dreams of
cotton candy and dragon flies
in hot afternoons,
long chases and mud on shoes,
from chalk powder on hands
leftovers from an attempt at
the unpolished canvas
before PT periods and sweat,
I forget the messages on greasy chits
and behind the brown papers
that enveloped my books,
back i am to darkness and sleep
now I trade nameslips with smiling supermen,
for a hand at the unfinished homework,
I hear voices telling me that H and O
leaves water, about constants
and variables of life,
about oxymoron and metaphors,
I read Dickens and Chekov
back home as dusk sets in,
I strain my brain and
sweat in the exam halls,
much like life, and the bell rings,
The dream is left in half,
broken, I would never know
how much I scored, I wake
to shakes and reality years after,
and stare at adulthood, perplexed.