When I was 5
I dreamed of the ocean,
slept in the dance of
the sweet sea.
When I was 21,
I figured birthdays had, mostly,
lost their importance.
When I grew up I thought
I didn’t belong in the world.
When I was growing up I
believed I didn’t fit.
When I was 23,
I embarked on this adventure.
When I was 22, I wrote about pain.
When I was looking back, I saw it.
Saw how…
When I was 14, I accrued
cat calls like spare change,
to be placed in a bank of memories.
When I was 15/ 16/ 17
I believed a poetic life was signified by death.
When I was 19
I thought the degree of breaking was inversely related
to the sincerity of love.
When I was 13
I knew something was wrong with me.
When I was 16
I thought failure
was a state of being
rather than a belief.
When I was 21 I barely wrote.
When I was 18 I thought
I’d die at 27.
When I was 19
I believed addiction was my salvation.
When I was 13/ 14/ 15/ 16/ 17/ 18/19
I believed my body was the sole power
I would ever possess.
And that eyes upon me
made my skin into constellations.
When I was young
I buried my heart in my throat;
I buried my desire in my belly;
I buried my ache in my skin.
When I was growing up
I believed every birthday meant more than it ever
turned out to.
When I was 15
I assumed boys would grow into men
and girls like me would always be just that.
Now I am 23
and I don’t know whether I’m a girl
or a woman.
Now I am 23
and failure is a state of mind, not
a state of being.
Now I am 23
and I can’t decide whether I hate my body
or I’m just afraid to let go.
Now I am 23.
I am fragile, still.
I am steady,
I am boring,
I am in love,
I am myself.
Now I am 24
and I know the most poetic of lives
are those lived in the pursuit of creating joy.
Now I am 24
and the world is on pause,
the uncertainty a great weight.
now is the time for healing,
it was never not the time for healing.
Now I am 24
and I’m continuing to learn who
I am.
Now I am 24
and the world keeps spinning, I
keep wondering, I
don’t know what’s next.
Yet I do know
what I’ve learned,
how I’ve loved,
what I’ve wrote,
and how I have lived.
Now,
I know more and more who I am not.
Now,
I am becoming exactly
who I am.