What I learned in school,
is what being damaged to does to you.
It teaches you struggle is a bad word
and that success is effortless
if you’re not perfect right away
you’re not right
at all
your words only have value
according to the rubric
your cries of pain are only noteworthy
when the wound blisters scarlet red
and sticks and stones are as harmless
as the air used to launch them,
never mind that they broke your spirit well before your bones
they’re just kids.

I was a kid too.
Yet you locked me behind
an iron desk for first an hour, then two,
because despite how desperately I pleaded,
you assumed that because you cared,
that meant you couldn’t hurt me.
I have no scars on my skin to
show you,
unless you count the words I never wrote
because thinking about this made me choke.

And writing about it made it real.

You don’t get a scar
when your body is convinced it can no longer draw breath,
and you learn to count to four and hold for four
before you ever open up a trig book
to page four.
I have scars because I am here to be healed,
I am here, still.

Trees that fall in forests don't scar,
but the grove where they once stood misses them.

This is how I rode my bike every day after school,
I rode it back home safely as I could.

Because I learned to shoulder my weight in gold
and understand on my own terms
that my gold standard
is the only one worth anything to me.