At the start of the academic year I'm usually very pumped and energetic and ready to make this year 'my year' - to pass all my courses and prove to myself that I can do better. As exam times approach, I start off with this super optimistic view, but as time passes, the energy level slowly starts dropping.

I still try to keep it up, after all there is another three quarters of the year that I still need to go through. The days becoming shorter, and the sun not shining as bright as I would like it to, do not really help either. How do you push yourself to keep up the motivation?

The following is a short poem I wrote trying to picture the arrival of fall and to show how there is nothing we can do to change the weather except for changing our perception of it.

FALL

Do you feel the tender touch of breeze today?
The wind whispering slow melodies in your ears,
Do you hear the crunched autumn leaves today?
For I hear them whine as fall draws near.

For yes he is here, today this day,
As tears pour down, from skies atop
Softly caressing the soil that lay.

Little we may do, for Mother* gets to choose.
Why not cherish this change we bear?
Not dance and sing as fall comes here?

(Limi Kalapurackal)

*Mother: mother Earth