Sixteen,
drenched feet tread
away from school to
a small pond I call home.
The rain beats against my back,
shoves my head into the water.
Water’s weight
drips from my hair
and shatters my reflection.
Now I am ugly.
Now I am a thousand plastic pieces polluting
this sickened sea and its
seasick schools of fish.
Deprecation drowning their gills and
choking out compliments.
Six pack rings
ring open their stomachs.
Swallowed plastic bags that
drift along the surface.
The surface of the water,
the surface of my face
fake in this plastic shadow
suffocating my gaze.
Vision fading,
my goals disintegrating,
dissociating into a saltwater solution:
one part school,
part parents,
part disappointment
drizzles down my esophagus and
evaporates into tear gas,
tearing my throat open.
Once a bottle so voiceless,
now a riptide of voices
pulling my tears back
to the edge of my eyelids.
The edge of a pond
shut tight under
ice sheets,
skating rinks for their words
worn down by the raindrops.
The rain,
the tears falling from
the clouds in my mind follow
the child melting his way back home,
opening the door to my soul.