Too Late

Too Late

Gorgeous baby blue sky.
Vibrant golden sun rays shining on everything it touched.
Puffy white cotton balls bounced along the sky.
It was beautiful out that day.
I found it hilariously ironic.
I watched them.
I heard it all.
I know they thought I couldn’t, but I did.
They talked in hushed whispered voices;

There she is.
It is the A.P student with all A’s.
I heard she got into an Ivy League school.
Well, I heard she’s never been to a party.
I heard she has never had a boyfriend.
I don’t know why; she could be pretty if she tried.
Well, I guess it is too late now.

What they heard was right.
I am the girl in all A.P classes with straight A’s.
I did get accepted into an Ivy League school, Cornell, if you were wondering.
I have never been to a party nor have I ever had a boyfriend.
And as for the pretty thing,
Well, I have ever never thought of myself as pretty.
Even if I did, I never had time to try to be beautiful.
Not like the other super models who roamed the halls like they were runways.
And they were right.
It is too late now.

I am only seventeen years old.
I am 5’5 with dark brown hair and dark brown eyes.
People say I have sad eyes due to the dark bags under my eyes,
Earned from long nights of studying and prepping.

I guess the word that best described me was plain.
I had normal light pink glasses.
A normal medium length hair cut.
I wore normal clothes every day,
Usually just a plain pair of faded jeans with an oversized sweater that covered everything.
There was not much to cover anyway.
I was only a B cup and my bottom certainly was no Nicki Minaj either.

I was not shy, but nobody ever asked me, so no one ever knew.
Until yesterday, the name Anna Gordan never meant anything to anyone.
That is me by the way.
I am Anna Gordan, or at least that is who I used to be,
When I spent my nights studying for exams instead of texting friends.
When I walked in the halls alone since I had nobody to laugh with on the way to class.
When I ate alone in the cafeteria getting ahead on homework and studying.
Or when I went home alone to repeat my studying schedule.

I guess you could say I was pretty boring.
Looking back now, I don’t think it was all worth it.
I worked so hard to get ahead but that is never what I wanted to do with myself.
I was studying to become a doctor.
My parents’ choice, not mine,
But when you are expected to be the perfect child,
You never say or do what you want.
You become like a soldier, just following orders.

I studied to be a doctor by day and dreamed of singing at night.
I thought I was pretty good.
The only compliment I will ever give myself;
That my singing voice is not that bad.
I mean, I am no Alicia Keys, but I’m pretty darn good.
Sometimes when I was really ahead of my homework, I wrote my own songs.
I hoped to share them with people one day.
Or at least tell my parents that I had talent elsewhere besides school.
But it is too late now.

I had hoped to perform in the school talent show.
Or to find a friend who shared common interests with me.
Or to join choir and drop Latin, since I was also taking Spanish.
My parents forced me to take Latin and drop my study hall,
Despite my arguments that Latin was a dead language.
But none of that matters.
It is too late now.

I remember the day well.
The day when my parents realized I was not perfect.
The day that even I failed to portray that everything is fine.
The day that I knew everything was too late now.

The doctors gave me the name of my attacker.
Cancer.
The number one killer.
The best assassin.
The harshest reality.

My mom cried.
Salty tears running down her pale pink cheeks.
My dad shouted at the world saying it was not fair.
I still do not know what upset them more;
The fact that they were losing their daughter,
Or the fact that everything they worked for was dying along with me.

It hurt.
Oh God did it hurt.
Blackness, with a booming red around the corners of my eyes.
The plague of fear that takes over in the night.
Will I wake up?
Is this my last night?
Does it even matter?

I do not know what hurt worse, the physical pain or the mental pain.
I reexamined my life.
Perfect.
Teachers Pet.
Momma’s little angel.
Daddy’s little princess.
A universities dream student.
Potential.
Going to go far.

Ironic, huh?
The only far place I’ll be going, is six feet underground.
Me and my potential.
Me and my stellar reputation as a parent’s perfect little princess.
I hope they enjoy seeing my crown of death,
Wrapped around my cold, pale, lifeless, pointless head that never went anywhere really.

I was going to die before I could mess up my parents’ dreams.
I was going to die before chasing after my own dreams.
I was going to die before any wild college parties or finding any real friends.
I was going to die before having any real fun in my life or doing anything I would regret.
I was going to die before I could awaken and find who I really wanted to be,
Not just the person who my parents created for me.

It was too late.
I had always listened to people say, live every day like it is your last.”
“You never know when your last day on earth will be.”
I wish I had listened.
I wish I had done at least one remarkable thing in my life.
The only legacy I have left behind are the highest SAT scores in my high school.
I wish I had lived.
Really I was not living.
I was merely put in hibernation mode,
Waiting for the day I turned eighteen to awaken the real me out of my slumber.
I should have awoken sooner.
But it is too late.

I have already reawaken.
I am still a virgin.
I am still normal,
But then again not.
I dance on the tips of the fluffy white cotton balls.
I sing down through the bright golden rays.
I watch my cold pale face sink deeper and deeper into the ground.
I watch my mother cry silent tears, holding her slowly rounding stomach.
I smile at the bump.

Guardian Angel,
I like the sound of that.
Protector of the perfectionists.
I couldn’t save me.
No, it was too late for that.
But the bump held hope for the family I once knew.
And the bump held hope for my future too.

I lay lazily on the clouds, taking it all in.
Remembering the last song I wrote.
So I lifted my head to begin to sing.
And began to slowly drift then float.

“I don’t want to be trapped anymore.”
“No I only want to be free”
“But now that I am at death’s door.”
“I know that it’s too late for me.”

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