Lighter

It's alright,

you can stop the snapping.

You can leave the little hole-in-a-wall cafe.

You can take off your hipster hats

and turn off that single spotlight.

I'm not here for that. 

I'm not here to be judged,

like I have been my entire life.

I told myself that I was finished

with the judgemental faces at the back of the classroom

and the hidden whispers behind my back. 

Rather,

I am here to save you.

To bring you out of this world

to leave all of this behind.

Forget the frozen yogurt, YouTube videos, memes of Jackie Chan, foodporn on Instagram, drama on reality television. 

Let all of it escape your mind. 

All that should be left is

your heart and soul. 

Now breathe.

It's heavy, isn't it? Carrying your heart and soul. 

Cradling your thoughts, emotions, and feelings.

Because you have so many that they are about to overflow

but you hold onto the lid as tightly as you can to supress them. 

Inhale. Gather all of those scrambled thoughts, emotions, and feelings. 

Condense them into a long rope that starts at your throat 

and travels all

the way

down

into your gut. 

Exhale. Let the rope of emotions tumble out of your mouth. 

Let every unsaid comment, withdrawn sob, silenced scream escape your lips.

Magically, it all comes together.

It becomes your entire life poured out 

for the world to see. 

But only you can truly know what it all means,

where it all came from.

And when you take your next breath,

you'll realize that

it's a lot lighter.

And you feel braver, stronger, more beautiful and confident than ever.

You don't care that you justt bared your soul to everyone around you

because you found a new relief,

a life-saver floating in the ocean for when you're too tired of swimming.

You found poetry. 

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