Waking up without the Grim Reaper
When i was little i was afraid of dying
until one day i wasn’t anymore
i prayed for it
my childhood ended.
5th grade
elementary school
i don’t remember how it started
but i remember begging my mom to buy me a long sleeve sweatshirt
black
i remember wearing it every day
even in the summer when the sweat would drip down my forehead and back
i remember everyone telling me that it was too hot to be wearing long sleeves
i remember telling them that i wasn’t hot
i remember lying to cover the scars on my arms
i remember being scared someone might think i was being abused
after all an eleven year old girl cutting her own wrist was shocking
rare i guess
i hadn’t even gotten my period when i first decided i was done with life
a child who hadn’t seen anything but everything all at once
i grew up fast
faster than most i assume
i figured things out quick
realized that life didn’t look good for me
a female in a mans world
an African American in a society run by whites
a minority
a poor child surrounded by the wealthy
i wasn’t like them
and at first i was fine with that
until i realized what it meant
i remember hating my body
my dark skin
my fat
my hair that wasn’t as straight as all the other girls
my life wasn’t bad
i mean it was average
i didn’t starve
i had a home
i wasn’t beaten or abused
but i felt lost
i don’t think i was the typical candidate for depression
i didn’t really fit the mold
i was just sad
i cried without a reason to cry
i always felt like nothing
empty i mean
like silence
the sound of air and stillness
growing older didn’t help much
i used to hate birthdays
i didn’t understand them
why we celebrated something our mothers did
why everyone was happy to be alive
i used to blow out candles secretly wishing for death
which i get is kinda fucked up
but it’s the truth
and i’ve always valued honesty
i don’t know when that all changed
i mean i don’t know if it truly has
my middle school experience was spent in various mental hospitals
pills
diagnosis
self harm
a suicide attempt
but everyday i didn’t harm myself
every day i tried to be better
it got harder to fall
to let myself fall
i told myself “you’ve worked too hard to give up now”
i believe i have a purpose
if only to write this poem
but i think it’s more
i hope it’s more
and i spend every day searching
i can’t remember the last time i was happy
truly happy.
and i want to feel that
i want to feel something warm
something that engulfs me but doesn’t feel like drowning
i want to feel alive
i honestly don’t know what this poem has to do with growing up
i don’t know what growing up really means i guess
when are you grown?
is it a mindset?
an age?
i feel like i’m still growing
i want to do so much
i want so much out of life
i want to sing
to write
to take photographs
to feel
and i guess wanting that is growing up.
waking up is the hardest part of my day
but doing that over and over again
breathing whether i want to or not
that is growth
that is life
my life
and the day that stops being hard
the day that i wake up happy to be alive and not wishing for more sleep
that is the day i’ll know that i’m grown
p.s
to whoever is reading or listening to this
i know this is probably not what you want or expected to hear
people like stories of growing up to be wrapped in sugar
but that is not me
and my poem is far from sweet
but it isn’t artificial
and that’s good enough for me