Poem by | Chloe Lim, she/her, Guest Writer
Illustration by | Kimberly Wee
feels like soup and old wine served
together—an acceptable palate
but an unconventional choice.
A child with parents that keep toggling
between play and pause; labels of
ill-matched ethical standards, a
misalliance, diminished values,
“Yale’s Not-US”. The people offer
new discourse, talks of plans and
prospects; yet the shadow of
bickering forefathers with
turned backs lingers. Are we no
more than a caricature of a school?
To have imbibed ourselves as “Fake yale”
that “even got the real colors wrong,” it
does seem like two halves that
do not fit.
two halves of a school
can also be collectively
commiserating with your Tower mates
because the Elm lift broke down again,
going overtime with genuine conversations
during office hours before adjourning to
UTown for 4pm kopi break, taking 33
to Supper Stretch at 1am after your
4 hour project meeting at Classroom 8. Wanting
to change your major and then changing it back,
movie screenings at LT1 and dancing in
the Foyer. Realising you did 8 class presentations
each semester and now, you can ask
pretty good questions. Grinding it out in the Library
to make yet another 2359 and then falling asleep,
going on sem-abroad and missing all your friends.
End-of-Sem Dinners and the endless photoshoots,
suite karaoke and midnight Indomee from the butteries.
Quiet conversations outside the practice rooms, brushing
your teeth with your friends, and knowing a game of
Mahjong will make it all okay.
amidst the many misconceptions,
failures, pockets of fatigue, a cultural chaos,
it is our blend that makes us spin, like a constant,
stable peace—an eye in the storm. And
like a diamond formed with pressure from
watchful eyes and wagging tongues, ’wrong’
is not the way to describe someone’s home.
