I wrote this poem about someone I met over the summer but never actually spoke to until the summer was over. He was one of the kindest, sweetest, smartest, and amazing people I have ever met. I completely fell in love with him and not some kind of puppy love. It was something only one other person has ever made me feel. He lives in Cape Town and I'll never see him again but the feeling he gave me when he called me gorgeous is something I will never forget and something I so long to feel again.

This is inspired by Van Gogh's pain palette that is in a glass case in an exhibit at the Rijks museum in Amsterdam.

On the second day of class, my ethics teacher posed a question. He wonders out loud "Who are you? Change the question and ask your self 'who am I, what am I?" Seemingly a straightforward question.

Logically, each of us should know who we are. We spend a few quiet moments writing about this question, till he stops us.

He askes one boy what he wrote. It was the predictable and reasonable answers: his name, where he's from, his age, grade, favorite baseball team. Not a wrong answer by any means.

The teacher stops us again. He askes what makes us who we are. No one answers, no one was expected to.

He brings up how, scientifically, each cell of our bodies is gradually replaced over the course of seven years. Meaning every seven years you are a new person. Yet, still the same person. How is this possible? If this is true, then what are we really, what makes us who we are, what decides this for us?

He then tells us what we are not.

We are not our names, our ages, where we live, what are hobbies are, what we have. "But," he questions "you all 'have' bodies. If we are not our bodies what are we? Are we are our souls? Do you have a soul, are you your soul? Where is this soul? Where does it dwell? Your body. And what of your mind. If you can lose it, then you have it. If you have it, then you are not it. So, if you are not your body, or your soul, or your mind, then what are you?"

As it turns out, the question is far more interesting than it seemed when first presented to us.

However, I disagree with the teacher on some points. You are your mind, body, and soul, but you are so so much more.

This is what I am...