These little pieces of myself will all burn away
After looking again and again
After taking it all to be real for so long
Not really looking at it
only just wearing it
even though it felt scratchy and ill-fitted

Now to give it a new sort of attention
the kind it gives to its concept of god
Not curious but
critical and cynical and carefully contemplative
the little pieces don’t get hurt feelings
or bent out of shape
cuz they lose it
They don’t cry or get depressed
Only they fall away
like overripe fruit
never picked and eaten
They are not what I am
Only the pieces that make up
who I once thought myself to be

I was never abused or depressed
Never victimized and alone
I was never ugly or stupid
or worthless or a hot mess
a **** or a lame
useless and insane
These pieces aren’t like a puzzle
See that’s what I never was told

I am whole already
Completely alive and free to discard
those adjectives that I don’t care
to describe this being
Which in reality can’t be any
or even all of those bits mashed-up together
Miracles can’t be picked apart and
named and labeled as what they are not
And a mirror only reflects
what might see it first

How can there be
what is clearly not seen
when I peer back into this so-called me?
So actually the truth I can see is
I can’t really look and see this I am
but truly can only be this I am
Because when I look back and see
all the pieces they say I am
the only conclusion must be
that these so-called pieces of me
are not at all in reality
that which I am