A College Dorm Room

The keyboard is burning under my hands as I stare at the screen. There are scattered coins on the carpet that I haven't bothered to pick up, and books everywhere that I won't read because I'll tell myself that I don't have time. There are two cups sitting at the top on my desk shelf that I received as gifts. The first one is a hand-spun ceramic with a navy blue glaze and I can make out the mottled reflection of the room in its shine. The second mug is a memento from my grandparents that is fifteen years old - There's a photograph melted on it of both of them. My grandfather died almost eight years ago. I keep it even though it's old and is still covered in the residue of soot from the fire that I can't scrub away no matter how hard I try.  Also on the top shelf are books left over from last semester - anthologies of literature, the complete works of John Milton, Jane Eyre; they remain as a kind of self-satisfaction for my intellectual ego. To my left is a bookcase that tells me I really should stop buying books because I no longer have a place to put them. Resting on the desk to my right is an old guitar that doesn't belong to me. The headstock is dusty and I still don't recognize the brand, but it sits there as a consistent distraction. Spread out over the desk are old receipts and lightly used textbooks, among other random things - like the mildly sardonic box of fake mustaches that were in the mail as a birthday present, or the homemade paper flowers with the light green print given in congratulations after one of my theater performances. Pennies, nail clippers, white sticky-tac, guitar picks, old pocket notebooks, and the foil and plastic pods of cold medicine also find their place. The walls that surround me are freshly painted and utterly blank, but the carpet itself is littered with worn pairs of jeans and stale laundry. My bed is covered with a tousled mess of blankets, remaining the most inviting thing in the room. Laying behind me are a stack of scattered papers that must have fallen off of the bed and they stretch out across the floor in reminder of all of the homework that needs to be written, revised, and completed.