"Just be yourself."

Something I have never understood was “being yourself.”

Who was I?

I had been taught to hide and pretend,

to go behind the curtain and save face,

where being me was not an option when perfection was.

I remember learning to smile when my parents would argue,

talking sweet nothings hoping to see a smile back,

making jokes in order to hide the fact that inside I was hurting.

My friends would complain I was rude,

that whenever I spoke it was soaked in bitterness, anger, rage, and hatred,

but they never knew the fact that I would go home to a house,

which only brought about the acidity in my attitude and demeanor.

That I would go home hoping that my parents would stop arguing and maybe he would come home today,

that my sisters would never acknowledge my exsistence,

and that I sat hoping would find love and I could somehow be happy.

They didn’t know.

I hid who I was,

pushing it into a corner,

hoping it would go away.

Today was smile day and I was the front-page news.

Words were always bitter in my mouth,

hardening in my venom palette every second before it escaped,

that would leave my mouth like darts,

abrasively cutting my next victim.

Poetry became a place of solitude.

Scribbling words of bittersweet tones and timbre became my safe space.

The words that sat vile and idle in my mind,

would then emerge delightfully in the air as a butterfly,

A spectrum of harmonious colors instead of the

sharp, cacophonous snake that my utterances once held.

I found a new approach to my words,

That they as honey could bring peace of mind instead of hell on earth.

My words formed into a story,

And I began to use them to explain who I was.

I could finally pull the curtain open

and speak in sweet imperfection instead of hiding in my pain.