Burn me
Scorch me
I am paper with dog-eared corners and ragged edges.
Treat me as you wish because I will still stand for the same things, whether I am bent or fresh, wrinkled or fine.
Childhood happiness is blurred with and chased by fleeting blissful memories. A swing between two parents as we walk to the commissary. A night spent on the sofa loyally waiting for my mother to return home. The shameless wail as I woke up cold and alone on the bed until my father rushed back and held me until the desperate crying ceased. That last sparkling Morning Glory that left a scar near the base of my skull on that last New Year spent as a family.
Hours spent wondering what I did wrong, how a mother and father could both so readily leave a three-year-old girl on her own in a world growing cold faster than that little girl could possibly keep up with. Lonely nights curled up in a tattered blanket, holding in steadily-flowing tears, determined to tough things out, choking on the salty beads, trying so hard not to make a noise.
Tear-soaked pages end up distorted. Opinions and feelings withheld for fear of being judged, looked upon strangely. Only six as I watch two friends whisper about each other behind each other's backs. How confusing. Why?
Burn me
Scorch me
I know that words hold no meaning without intent or action behind them. I refuse to bow down to statements with no root beneath them.
Nothing is wrong; I never got the memo that says it's okay to share feelings, and no one ever asked. Put a smile upon your face and laugh along with everyone because no one will want to be friends with someone with deep wrinkles and frowns and burdens.
My lines lacked definition, any meaning between the stanzas. Lips twisted upwards in an attempted show of empathy.
"Listen to other's problems, but never reveal your own. Your problems are worthless, nothing compared to theirs. Lock up your opinions because people already have their own, they don't want to hear it. Besides, you can't espouse them if you aren't even sure they're yours.
"Trapped in your head with no one to vent to. Pent up frustrations do nothing but confuse you."
I want to break out. I long for it. My hummingbird heart refuses to reside in a cage, but I've no clue how to break out. Smiles with classmates feel brittle and thin, but they're smiles anyway so keep it up, at least they help. At school I felt joyous, if picked on. Stayed out for as long as I could to avoid going home to the lack of appreciation, the lack of love.
But 12 years old, who was I to devise my own definition of something that nobody in ages has figured out? Lies sprawl out across the floor, meaningless derisions draped over foggy windows. Noxious air gradually choking the will to step forward out of me.
Burn me
Scorch me
I convinced myself that the words of others can never harm me, but when it comes to family, what choice do I have but to take it? The harm, the guilt, the trapped, strangled limbs here, tangled and intertwined with the shadowy tendrils of my hopeless, naive mind.
One more day, one more hour, counting on the minutes as they slid by. What am I living for? Isn't there more?
Shhk, shhk.
I carved a different chapter onto my pages.
Dark, beaded ink slowly dripped from the pen tip.
Nothing could hurt more than what we inflict upon ourselves, right?
Wrong.
An apathetic, absent father unable to realize that that little girl he left was still screaming from the inside. He took a glance at the words etched onto my page. . .
But my father never was a reader. . .
No more mistakes carved into my pages. I respect myself more than that now and I refuse to let myself feel like nothing again.
I met someone, an interesting someone. A dorky, scrawny, intriguing someone. Without trying, he opened my eyes to ambition. Without ever actually touching me, he took hold of my hand and encouraged me to live independently, taught me to work hard for my passions. Animating, drawing, writing, spilling my heart out into anything I created, and he admired my creations.
I fell from the top shelf of the bookcase of hope he let me build, but he was busy recovering from his own fall. Nobody caught me, but that was alright.
Burn me
Scorch me
I met another someone who reminded me of me.
Me? Yes, me. A me from long ago who had looked at the world with wide, naive eyes full of hope and joy. And yet, he also held a sadness, a loneliness that made me feel like I was trying to connect the me of the past and the me I was then, knowing him. We built a kinship. He helped me write a happier chapter with ink bled from compassion and optimism, while acknowledging that the universe doesn't care about us. It's why we must care about those around us. He taught me how to lean on others when I can no longer stand alone.
Read me
Observe me
Look on at the story I write for myself.
My heart is on my sleeve, for anyone willing to embrace me.
I've met a person who encourages all the different sides of me that make me, me. My binding is loosening, my pages being spread open to finally feel the sun's warmth. Innocent, honest, and open.
This person's been hurt, I could see it. As a friend I watched his pain bloom in the way he chased, the way his dark brown eyes seemed black with the dullness of heartbreak. Trying to find footing on crumbling cobble.
How do you slash at someone who would have given you the world within a heartbeat if he could? How do you demand such sacrifice and never offer up the same in return? How do you hold up two pains and compare them? There is no way to measure them. Your sufferings are great, no doubt, but don't you ever dare tell anyone that theirs aren't. Just because you think someone else's problems are nothing to you, doesn't make those problems any less real to them!
How do you claim to love and care about someone, when in the very same breath you would cut him down and rain thorns down the back he willingly exposed for you because he trusted you?
How do you stare at someone you call a friend and make them feel like they're weak because their pain seems less than yours, to you?
Yell at me
Throw me
Across the room. Scream at me about how much you would love to slit my binding with the knife you think I left in your back. Call me a fool for wearing my heart on my sleeve. Rip out my pages and scatter them in the wind. Let them soak out in the rain as my story smears before your eyes. I will never apologize for investing heart and effort into the bonds I make. Nor will I ever regret the day I confessed to such a gentle, honest soul that resonated with mine in such a way that made my hummingbird heart reach a peace that it has never known.
Read me
Observe me
As a frightened child transitions into an adolescent striving to learn, to progress, to make connections. A girl who would have never written about this, had this been assigned even only a year ago.
Growing up I told myself I wanted to feel as much as I possibly could, but lacked the courage to ever put myself out there. Here I am in front of you, the pen to continue writing the novel of my life poised in my breath.
Respect me
Wreck me
I am paper with white-out streaks and singed edges.
Treat me as you wish because I will stand for the same things, whether I am bent or fresh, wrinkled or fine.
((A/N: This is a spoken poem that I wrote for creative writing. I'll be performing it tomorrow in front of my class and yeaah. I hope you guys enjoy it. I love you guys <3))
