Body and flesh with the age of seventeen,
without being loud or angry.
Never been,
the warm yellow light.

Spiraling out of control.
Calmness collapses.
Burning a hole,
in what is assumed to be poured.

Deep pigment,
showering over loved once.  
Yet no commitment.
Daffodils growing in the garden.

Dripping from the ankle,
deep red,
ropes to get strangled.
Melting and mixing orange.

They may not know how i’m feeling,
but if they stop reality,
they see me hanging from the sealing.
“How young was she?”

we are not gathered here in memory
of the 17 who lost their beautiful smiles
and laughs and futures to your
precious laws that may have applied to the seventeen hundreds
but now? we don't need these machines
this danger.

we don't need this fear inside of us
the feeling of being stalked
in the hallways of the same building you
previously walked before without a second thought
but now it could happen. and it's more real than
ever before.

those 17 could have been me and
my friends and peers. they were a mere drive away from
that place i go everyday where i see the people
i love. to know that one day they could be on the floor
next to my desk or my still
lifeless
body.

that terrifies me.

tell me, how are you not
terrified? how does it not scare you, that your
next wave of voters are terrified of your inability to act after
the nightmare that became our reality.

we are gathered here to tell you that
we
demand
change.

i turn 19 today.
i feel the same
as 18
which felt alot
like 17
not much different
from 16 either.

i feel my age
i see my wall
i see the light
behind it.

It’s been 17 years since your birth
Yet there isn’t a number to describe what your worth
It is more than the count of curls on your head
More than the amount of books that you’ve read
You could count all the stars and they wouldn’t compare
To the kindness you give and the love that you share
I’ll wish you much luck when you travel around
And when your head’s in the clouds don’t forget to look down
Because we’ll lose our smiles
But we’ll see yours for miles
What’s special about you, Gillian, my love
Well it’s just that, it’s your love

The best year of my life
It all blurs together
Into a seamless, funny film
It's an old film, a heartwarming one
There's static on the screen
There's soft French jazz in the background
I'm golden
You're golden
It's all golden
This is the only way I can see the past year
It was a massive wave of change,
A wave that brought you in,
And has kept you here
This has been the best year

12:00 a.m.
Now it's over,
And you're still here.

I
Eating dirt and drinking rain
Holding me tight on this ground.
I would never fly again,
Sins I've done, spread around.

II
Eating dirt and drinking rain
All alone in this space.
Every day is all the same,
For thousand years, same old place.

III
Eating dirt and drinking rain
Darkness, only friend for me.
Freezing moon, hand is cold,
Mind, the only enemy.

16 summers spent at home.
My dark bedrooms tempting me with comfort,
And betraying me with loneliness.
The weeks leading up to school became slow crawls
Through cabin fever.

My favorite word was no.

No to festivals.
No to summer camp and sleepovers.
No to birthday parties and bonfires and beach days.

No is dangerous. The more I said it, the easier it was. No was sad, but misery loved my company. No gave me a pair of jade-colored glasses.

Yes started to look like a barbed-wire fence
One foot off the ground.
If I could only jump over it,
I'd reach the greenery of the other side...

But what if I tripped?

So, when my friend asked if I wanted to go to a bonfire on the last day of school,
I got nervous.
My stomach knotted up
Like the headphones in my bedroom.
My safe, dark bedroom...

I said yes.

Then I said yes to late-night adventures.
Yes to journalism camp 3 hours away.
Yes to grad parties,
And movie nights,
And dates.

Yes is powerful.
'
Yes was meeting people from California.
Yes was laughing in Walmart on a Tuesday.
Yes was a bouncy house,
And dying my hair rainbow at 2 A.M.,
And holding hands with friends
When walking across the street.

Yes was the 17th summer.
The best summer of my life.

The summer that made me believe in yes.

Yes gave me new experiences,
Closer friendships,
Good times.

If I know nothing else,
I know I was happy.

Saying yes is not easy
When all you know
Is no.

But no is a slow,
Comfortable
Death.

I chose life.
And it was the best choice
I've ever made.

Learning to say yes
Was learning about my city,
My friends,
And myself.

I love all of these things dearly.

I believe in saying yes.

Yes to festivals.
Yes to summer camp and sleepovers.
Yes to birthdays and bonfires and beach days.

Yes to my city,
And my friends,
And myself.

Yes to life.