Because I Was
I am because I was
I was naive
I was deceived
I was young
I was told one day
“No Courtney that is not your life.
What you thought was all a lie.
You’ve lived in ignorance for years
But here is the truth
Now what will you do?”
I am because I was
I was at that point lost
I was hurt and confused
I felt nothing and everything
HOW
COULD
THAT
BE?
I cut away the girl I used to be
I disguised her skin with weird markings
I melted it
I thrashed it
I made sure that she could never look at it again
Without the shame of what she had done
I abandoned her like the truth had abandoned me
I am because I was
But what I was at that point is gone
But who I was is not over yet
I was so much more than the lines before this
I was failing out of math
I was burning holes in my brain
I was eating drugs and taking alcohol
And I knew that’s not the way it goes
But my brain was
D
A
M
A
G
E
D
I am because I was
I was all those things
But I’ve been for so long
That my was isn’t quite over yet
I am because I was
I was waking up
I was realizing my potential
I was cutting not myself but the bad people out
I was controlling
Not people but myself
So I was cutting the bad people out and controlling myself
But not cutting myself and controlling people
AT THIS POINT
I was doing alright
And I was so many things before now
And now
I
AM
I am strong
I am a leader
I am passionate
I am a woman
I am more
More than I ever was
You see the AM can be so much more than the WAS
And that is the most important part
I am never was
I was what I was
But now I AM
I am something
And you can be something too
The was isn’t what it’s about
It’s the AM that you can choose
It’s the AM that makes you WHO YOU ARE
No you mustn’t forget the was
The was is the most important part of w h o I w a s
But the am is the most important part of w h o I w i l l b e
And I’ll take the am over the was because
I . AM . ME .