Reading time:2 min read

Poem: Resumption Blues

“Welcome back to school,” they say,
as if we return to ease and promise.
But resumption is no gentle homecoming,
it is the shuffle of feet chasing 8AM lectures,
the hassle for seats in crowded halls,
the burden of timetables we did not design.

Some begin at dawn, some idle till noon,
yet all are bound by the same weight
deadlines crouching like hunters,
group work waiting with silent demands,
and the weeks unfolding like a long corridor;
we must walk whether or not the path feels kind.

Here, balance is a rumour we laugh at,
Garri and bread fill the hunger gaps,
where proper meals should stand,
sleep is broken into fragments;
between night readings and early alarms,
the hostel hums with tired whispers,
the library glows deep into the night,
and by the second week,
we are already chanting,
“week two of eleven, we go again,”
as though counting our own exhaustion
were the only way to survive it.

And at the end of this weary calendar,
What treasure do we hold?
A degree, polished and framed,
yet heavy with uncertain value.
In a land where certificates stack higher than jobs,
where bright youths wait in lines too long,
we wonder if these years of toil
are the price of wisdom or the waste of strength.
So resumption becomes a ritual of struggle,
not a welcome back, but a reminder,
the struggle resumes
and we are; its willing players.