From youth, I knew not all plants grow --

Some are cut at the roots,

Some sprout of row,

And some never see the light of day

And feel the rain on their leaves

And the sun on their cheeks

But the past year would not deny me

The growth I sought peaking through the Ivy --

 

Admiring pedals upon a frame of adolescence

I wondered who was this boy unshaded by depression,

Who was this sprout of happiness not anxious of class lessons

Or how his taproot did not spread itself with pessimism.

He did not compare his flower of hopes

To the heights and greatness of a Red Oak.

But instead he bloomed a botanical beauty of passion

Bursting his bud into blind dreams ready for whatever may happen.

He is what I iconicized -- what I wanted

The culmination of what I was shaped back into.  

 

I soaked in the morning dew; A morning which lasted 365 days

I learned the earth-shattering power of a broken heart

Making roses bleed and trees split apart.

I learned I can be a prick not in the cactus variety

But in a way where peers may despise me.

I learned the actual strength of the stem I stand upon

One without therapy and medication to fully rely on

One without company to provide a shoulder to lie on

One without a garden called home--

I grew stronger into the soil

And more comfortable in my skin

I found pride in being loyal

And detached myself from blessings and sins

I became a new me--

A potted daisy with no fear of learning

A wild magnolia unblocked by curtains

Anything I wish through the shears of purpose

So I shall cherish this year because the next is uncertain 

 

With signs of maturity but only 16 years old

I'd prove there is more than just potential within this kid.

I always knew not all plants grow--

But I know at least that this one sure did.