if you keep telling me that i’m useless

eventually i will believe you and

fade away like too many washes of blue jeans and

crawl instead of walk and

sigh instead of talk

and

you can’t measure the worth of a person by the tightness of their mouth 

or the whiteness of their eyes

i spent years hiding these scars with long sleeves

pushing through the summer heat just so 

you wouldn’t start asking the right kinds of questions and

looking at me the wrong sort of way

i am tired of the expectations of those around me

telling me that when i struggle just enough to get over it

and if i struggle too much it’s my own damn fault

stop mutilating the syllables of my name

like they were dead leaves my father

envisioned much more for me than that

i refuse to be the doll you up and got tired of.

i am not garbage.

And you are not my hero.