Who I Am
My English teacher once asked,
For me to write a poem
About who I truly was
Yet I hadn’t had a clue
I went home that day
And looked in the mirror
I saw myself staring back, wondering
Is this all there is to me?
Am I my bright red hair,
that makes me different from the rest
Or am I my teeth, overly straightened by metal contraptions
to please a society based on being the best
I realized I was only looking skin deep -
That I am not an image produced by a shiny surface
Nor am I a number, or weight, or gender
And certainly not what society wants me to be
I am the doodles on the top of my math homework
I am the bowl of oatmeal I eat every Sunday morning
with a dash of cinnamon and blueberries
I am the pieces of songs that play endlessly in my head
I am the thoughts that drown my soul at two in the morning
when I think that no one is awake
I am the girl who cried at SeaWorld when she was six,
because seeing animals in cages made her sad
I am the girl who has watched every episode of Gossip Girl - twice,
just so she can pretend she knows what it is like to live in New York City
I am the girl who needs to make daily lists of every little thought and thing,
yet can never keep her room straight for longer than a day
I am the girl who climbed the Great Wall of China,
who snorkeled with sharks,
who survived honors biology,
but is still scared to tell people how she truly feels
These thousand little things are the bindings of my being
The food of my soul
And the meaning of me
Without them I am just a name,
Like a being without a voice,
And a girl without a face
Without them, I become like everyone else
A fragment of wasted youth and dreams
Confined to a reality of being
A mirage of myself
Lost in society