I want to be that girl in the photograph
The one where happiness is etched on her face
And her eyes are overflowing with joy
The one where her smile shows her passion
And how she’s so full of confidence
The one where her expression shows her courage
And how she uses it to set her ambitions high
The one where she’s so comfortable being who she is
And so at ease with doing what she loves
The one where there’s no sign of fear
Nor even a little hint of doubt
The one where trust comes naturally
And a fault isn’t to be found

But sometime between then and now
Life threw what it could at her
And her confidence wavered
Her courage was destroyed
Her ambitions thrown away
Her eyes left lifeless
Her smile was forced
And any love, trust or happiness was gone
And she was no longer the girl in the photograph,
The one where she was caught in the middle of a laugh

Then sometime a little after now
A realization hit her quite hard
The girl in the photograph came to see
That it wasn’t life that made her feel empty
She opened her eyes and was surprised at what she saw
It was her who’d taken herself down, with a mighty hard blow
And she was the reason she suffered such pain
So sick of it she became
That she stood up and braced herself
And made a decision that would change her life
She decided: She was going to be the girl in the photograph again.