Examination - A Student’s Lamentation Poem by Ibrahim Bidu

Sleepless nights I have spent

Reading

Revising

Cramming

And memorizing.

I have also noted with dismay

So many times

That I have lost count

All that effort go down the drain

As questions fail to come

From what I have struggled to cram.

But isn’t what I have crammed

Part of what am taught –

What I’m supposed to have learnt?

If I fail,

Can it be said,

And would it be fair

To assume I haven’t learnt?

Not forgetting I gave views

On areas that skipped my notice

During the cramming race

Even though they were different

From those I was expected to regurgitate.

But come on!

Am I not to have an opinion?

Secretly, sometimes I believe

Mine make more sense

Than those I’m to regurgitate!

How I wish I could lay my hands

On the fellow who invented exams