Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to work
the dots and loops of Arabic script, or to take pencil against a field of electromagnetic forces
and, in calculations, quantify them. To die — to sleep —
no more — and by a sleep to say we ignore the grades and the trivial values of society's academia
that success is heir to — Ah! 'tis a consummation
devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep ...
To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub,
for in that sleep of academic irresponsibility what dreams may come,
when we have shuffled off this tragic work ethic,
must give us pause. There's the respect
that makes calamity of a college life.
For who would bear the sleeplessness and lack of time,
the incoherent TAs, the chauvinistic professors,
the pangs of despised lunch, the cruel RA,
the injustice of Res Life, and the snide remarks
that the less intelligent of us endure,
when one oneself might his quietus make
with a burdened bolster? Who would classes bear,
to study and labor under a wearying workload,
but that the dread of societal failure,
the pitifully evinced state in whose bourn
any poor resident is despised, puzzles the will
and makes us rather bear those ills we have
than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conformation doth make cowards of us all,
and thus the native hue of independence and self-formation
is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of rationality,
and enterprises of great pith and moment
with this regard their currents turn awry,
and lose the name of action. — Yet soft you now!
The call of physics! Mine major, in thy tests
be my cruel studies remembered.
Anne Conover
sophomore
Pasquerilla East Hall
Nov. 22
