From the Archives: The night before Dean's Date

As tradition dictates, the 'Prince' brings you P.G. Sittenfeld's poem "The night before Dean's Date." The poem was originally published in 2005.

'Twas the night before Dean's Date,

When throughout every college

Students were furiously typing,

Spewing late-gotten knowledge.

For the previous week,

They'd been in trivial pursuit -

A little book learning

A lot of Beirut!

Computer clusters were packed,

The printers were jammed,

Eager email-checkers

Rifled through spam.

Jane from Miami

Yearned to be my friend.

But could she help write a paper?

Make the dread deadline bend?

Eight pages by morning

On a book I'd not read:

A task which produced

Well-deserved jolts of dread.

At "Grapes of Wrath"

I'd not taken one look,

The formulaic response:

"CliffsNotes" + movie = book.

Through my cinder block walls

I heard wailing, sensed tears

From orgo-crazed premeds

And from poor engineers!

When what to my wondering eyes

Should appear?

A forgotten assignment

And with it, new fear;

A French oral report

Had been overlooked.

How could this be?

My night was well overbooked.

Now Bogan! Now West!

On Fleming! On White!

If to love them is wrong

I don't want to be right;

But the work they've assigned?

Tantamount to a sin!

Wherefore Princeton's promise:

The hard part's getting in?

Those damned disciplined students

Were snugly nestled in bed.

Why can't I be more like them?

Am I worthy, Dean Fred?

I knew unless I got started

My paper would bomb.

So I digressed for an hour

To facebook.com.

Then away to the 'Wa

I flew like a flash,

Needing caffeine and munchies

For this pre-Dean's Date dash.

Though things looked quite grim,

I mantra-ed, "I am a fighter."

And embarked with false hope

On a wretched all-nighter.

Victimized yet again

By my procrastination,

And to make matters worse,

Here comes grade deflation.

But my one cheering thought

Made me sort of elated:

How can one deflate

What's already deflated?

P.G. Sittenfeld is a member of the Class of 2007 and a former columnist for The Daily Princetonian.