I am told to change.

 

Never to my face. That would be too simple.

 

But in the magazines and the movies

and the momentum of society carrying them forward.

 

You are not right. Change.

 

I can try to change. Squeeze my thoughts, myself, into a mold

predetermined by some entity I have never seen.

 

But I just don’t fit. My edges are too soft for that rigid outline.

I don’t know what I am, and neither do they.

 

I could try to change what they think. Make them see that

there are more people outside of the mold than in it. That even though

we choose to admire it, we were not made for it.

 

But the thoughts are already in place. Nailed down since

the first time we ran hands over glossy pages.

 

I would rather change myself. And you, too.

Let us have the courage to embrace our moldless, undefinable selves.

Let us see that we are different, just like they always told us, and that in

our differences we make our own molds.

Lay out who we are and who we want to be.

No one else can fit into my mold besides me.

 

Let us all be the proud, the moldless.

The odd, or the normal.

The outcast, or the socialite.

The slacker, or the worker.

The dreamer, or the realist.

Let us all be happy to be who we are.

Change what you think about yourself, because you are perfect.