In every classroom, the game begins the same way
There are those who draw the longer white sticks,
Some find the losing, short, worn pieces of chalk
It’s from chance, they say, but some children bring extras
“They’re from home!”
In the end, in this room, learning only lasts as long as the chalk does.

The sound of forty pencils chase the writing on the board,
Dull, endless, interrupted merely by the looking up.
The sigh before another borrowed thought,
As imitation marks the intelligence of one.
Whispers hush as the chairs press together,
Taking cramped breaths in a room made for twenty.

When the mind drifts with the hum of a broken fan
And the breaking of worn-out shoes speaks louder,
The pencil moves, but the mind stays still,
And the absentminded nod of the teacher encourages.
Perhaps this is what’s best for them, they say,
This is all those with the short end can do.

What a privilege it is to learn, what a necessity it is to write,
Life proves harsher to those who are not able to.
But lessons are considered now learned without understanding,
And with those who govern, they merely care about numbers.
The winning prize of reaching beyond words plastered,
To let the ink seep through more than paper is long forgotten.

The game of chalk marks more than just the classroom.
The dust on the floor making marks on children far more than anything else.
Some read the board but not the world beyond it,
Some echo aloud but never understand the words,
What they know is chalked up to their circumstance of birth,
Yet the bell still rings, the chalk runs out,
and those on the losing end fail to grasp it.

Editor’s Note: This literary piece was first issued in the August-November 2025 First Semester Newsletter of Atenews.