I’m sitting in the kitchen of a house that smells like grout

From the time I helped retile it, your average Eagle scout

It’s less of a viewfinder

Than a bittersweet reminder

That this was the day this time last May when mom and I moved out

 

My dad had an affair and so we scored a new abode

Which is sick because my boyfriend lives four minutes up the road

The new arrangement’s better

But I’m always the abetter

Set to smother all my mother’s latest manic episodes 

 

Thanks to God in all His goodness I am happy to recall

That despite the weights atop my head, I’m really growing tall

I’m no longer scared of college

Since I’m brimming with the knowledge

That those I love are never far, and all I have to do is call

 

I’m very near eighteen now and I don’t know how to drive

But no car will bring me closer to the goal for which I strive

I want to be a writer,

Which is infinitely tighter

Than my last year’s chit, which I’ll admit, was simply to survive

 

I want to be a writer with a deep voracious itch

(Or a maybe a librarian, I haven’t chosen which)

So others, then, may see

Books like those that guided me

Books that teach you, no, beseech you, when your life has come unhitched

 

I want to take the messy bits that once filled me with fright

And use them to help others, which is why I plan to write

Sometimes when you’re alone

You’re more likely to be prone

To accept advice, the paradise, that it will be alright

 

I’m twenty-six pounds lighter than I was this time last June

And I’ve got ambitions rising like a little red balloon

From high up there I will gaze

Across promising new days

With a telescope I really hope that I will see them soon