I was sitting in my private school, around age 8

The religion teacher said everyone sit in a circle

Don’t speak

Close your eyes

Raise your hand when you hear God speak to you

One by one each child raises their hand

I sat

Thinking

I saw on tv that only crazy people hear voices in their heads

 

No, my teacher said “it’s alright Annie, not everyone can hear the light of god”

 

Open your bibles kids!

 

But I didn’t understand religion

You see

I was 8 years old

I was the kid that went to a private school and thought god was a black woman who rode the subway and asked strangers for money because her kids needed to eat

and

I thought god was a dog who had just been beat

and I thought god was my aunt Sue

 

You see I didn’t know who I was at age 8

And I didn’t know who I wanted to be

 

I didn’t understand my personality yet and I didn’t know when I would turn the age where your childhood photos look nothing like you

I wanted to look like the girls in the movies and act like the girl next door and feel like I know exactly who I am in my core

I wanted to be someone I wasn’t

in order to feel like someone I wanted to be

because that’s who I thought I was

or who I thought I could be

Deranged in a world in which I didn’t understand myself, feeling like i’m wading in a continental shelf

I’m a creature of creation but in my own condemnation against my own frustration for feeling fixated on finding myself

Looking for liberation from my 12 year old self

I didn’t know who I was supposed to be

I hit middle school and all of my friends became depressed

They said their days consisted of migraines

Their moods contradicted each other like political campaigns

Their lungs filled with something like propane

Your veins

Are pumping

And you predict for only 3 more days

Your parents don’t understand because

“being 14 is a part of life.

And you'll get out of this phase

but right now your mood is pissing me off

and I'd like it if you'd just go in your room and study”

So you

Research

How to tie a noose

Your collar gets loose

 

And then three years later most of you wake up

But some of you don’t

 

We didn’t know who we wanted to be

But I knew I wanted to be good at something

We were just too young to know that

Sometimes

In order to find your talents

Or experience the highs of your life

You have to go through some pretty intense lows

 

I chose to compose my inspiration from my brother

Who

Went through a starvation of a childhood

When he spent his school days listening to the cruel kids because

he wasn't a cool kid

but now my brother is the coolest guy

to ever sing you gwen stefani

and britney spears

and tell you that you look fabulous

But he’ll probably say it in Italian or german or spanish or russian or portuguese

Because he’s just that talented now

He showed me and shaped me

He taught me resilience

I didn’t know who I was

But I knew I wanted to be like him

 

I knew he was once one of those depressed kids

Repressed and distressed

But he’s impressed us all beyond any overcomings

Becoming a man that studied every religion

Befriended every stereotype of a human

Overcame every obstacle his social life encountered  

And came out on top

 

Two months from now

A little boy bullied beyond belief

Will be a man shipping out for training to fight for our country

A scatter plot poem equates that my past doesn’t define my future or your future and clearly not my brothers future