When I Was Little

June 18, 2018

When I was little I wanted to work with words

I wanted my voice to be heard

Amidst the noise of all the others in the world

I wanted to construct skyscrapers built of verbs,

Towering miles above the earth

But unlike babylon, my goal was never heaven

And it wasn't the sun

I wanted to dictate diction and denotation

I wanted to influence the population

With meaning and connotation.

I wanted everyone's vocabulary

To grow and increase exponentially,

And maybe then, potentially

We’d know the meanings of “peace” and “love” and “human being.”

When I was little, I wanted to work with letters

I thought that somehow, things would get better

If we figured out how to arrange them in a way

That we’d finally get across what we meant to say

Instead of tripping over tongue tied attempts at communicating

I wanted to lift society out of this fog of unintellectual dialogue

Consisting of acronyms, abbreviations, and mnemonics

Like “YOLO” and “LOL” which both sound idiotic.

When I was little I wanted to work with words

But at seventeen, I now find it absurd

To try to control the puppet master the king of everything that screams “disaster”

But at seventeen I still want to work with language

Because there is no greater fragrance

Than published words on untouched pages

When I was little, I didn't want to be a dentist, lawyer, or doctor

I wanted, and still want, to be an author.

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