To this day kids are being called names.  The classics were ‘hey stupid’, ‘hey spaz.’  Seems like ever school has an arsenal of names getting updated each year.  And if a kid breaks in a school and no one chooses to hear it, do they make a sound?  Or are they just background noise on a soundtrack stuck on repeat and people say things like, ‘kids can be cruel.’  Every school was a top circus tent and the pecking order went from acrobats to lion tamers, from clowns to carnies, all of these miles ahead of who we were - we were freaks.  Lobster clawed boys and bearded ladies.  Oddities juggling depression and loneliness, trying to kiss the wounded parts of ourselves and heal.  

But at night, while the others slept - we kept walking the tightrope as practice and yes, some of us fell.  But I want to tell them that all of this, is just debris.  Left over from when we decide to smash all the things we thought we used to be.  And if you can’t see anything beautiful about yourself, get a better mirror, look a little closer, stare a little longer.  Because there’s something inside you that made you keep trying, despite everyone who told you to quit.  

You built a cast around your broken heart and signed it yourself, you signed it ‘they were wrong.’  Because maybe you didn’t belong to a group or a clique.  Maybe they chose you last for basketball or everything.  Maybe you used to bring bruises and broken teeth to show and tell but never told because how can you hold your ground if everyone around you wants to bury you beneath it - you have to believe that they were wrong.  They have to be wrong.  Why else would we still be here?  We grew up to cheer on the underdog because we see ourselves in them.  We stem from the root planted in belief that we are not what we were called.  We are not abandoned cars stalled out and sitting on an empty highway, and if in someway we are, don’t worry, we only got out to walk and get gas.  We are the graduating class of we made it.  Not the faded echoes of voices crying out, ‘names will never hurt me’.  Of course they did.  But our lives will only ever always continue to be a balancing act.  That has less to do with pain, and more to do with beauty.  


**BEAUTY

"when people leave, they take a part of you with
them. so many have left, there's nothing left to take."

"please don't be sad."

"darling, you can't be sad when you're empty. you
can't be anything."

you + me
i thought
we would
stay together
for infinity

i felt like
i was in
my prime

but you
subtracted
me from
your life

i woke up wanting to kiss you

ART IS STILL ART NO
MATTER IF CRACKED,
SMUDGED, BROKEN-
MAMA HE IS BROKEN BUT
HE IS STILL ART, STILL
BEAUTIFUL TO ME