Pencil

The pencil is a magical object  

It holds the ability to extract the things that you are feeling from your soul and place it on a piece of paper however you’d like

The pencil is only limited when the human hand hesitates to write what the heart has to say

As poets, the simple task of writing what we feel never seems to be a problem

But what about those who don’t write

Think of all the unwritten feelings

The unwritten thoughts

The unwritten stories that never leave the fingertips of those who are afraid of their feelings, their thoughts, their stories being heard

Think of all the words that wait anxiously at the tip of a pencil but never escape the dull grey point in which they are trapped

Think of the boy who goes home everyday to a broken family and a brutally abusive father

His dad takes his pencil and turns it into a weapon

He erases the boys imagination, draws shades of black and blue on his arms and fragile chest, and uses the lead to create a weight too heavy for him to carry

He finds his way into the boy’s colorful dreams and turns them into colorless nightmares

What about the girl who replaces her pencil with a razor

And instead of writing what she feels on a piece of paper, she carves her thoughts into her skin

Substituting blood for lead, scars for words, and tears for an eraser

With her blood she writes down how she is bullied constantly everyday about how she is fat and ugly, you’re fat and ugly, God why am I fat and ugly?

And what about that kid at school who is deathly afraid of coming out of the closet for the fear of rejection, ridicule, and rebuilding relationships

He puts on a show at school so everyone thinks he’s “normal” but goes home and cries, he cries and prays for God to make him “normal”

He would write down his feelings if he weren’t so scared of parents finding out who is really is

That use to be me. I use to be the kid who cried at night praying for God to make me “normal”

Fearing rejection and damnation because of my sexuality

And the night that some kid holds in one hand a bottle of pills, and a pencil in the other

I pray to God that he chooses the pencil

I hope that he realizes he is worth it, his story is not over, and he is different, but that’s okay

God made him that way and there is nothing wrong with him

And I can’t change, even if I tried, even if I wanted to, my love, my love, my love he keeps me warm, he keeps me warm

And so does my beautiful, magical pencil

And I will never take it for granted