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Exam fever

The nervous coughs
and shuffled chairs give one last
laugh down marble stairs
that echo should know names
of literary fame, etched in brass.

You may turn the page
on a mind that’s blank
a soldier in the trenches
lost to gun shots
only silence in his ears.

Everyone else is moving faster than me,
panic slips a hand
inside my chest, demands
I start my quest with
unfinished reading,
but my mantra knows best.

Through the joints of old oak doors
beyond the click on cold tiled floors
across bowed heads in hallowed halls
a calmness calls my chi.
The graphite spills
controlled at will by years of books
librarians looks and post-it’s stuck.
Passages pulled and torn apart
with confidence I make a start.