To You

For all the heartbroken teenage poets whose hearts are filled with unspoken rhymes, for the lovelorn adolescent authors whose beloved words are spoken out of time, for the forgotten child prodigies whose forgettable stories are left behind, this one goes out to you. For all the girls whose waistbands wrap two times around their hips because last week they lost another pound because their twice-pierced ears are pierced with the sounds of hiss-whispered rumors they can’t beat down, this one goes out to you. For all the young men whose fathers tell them who they are going to be and what they are going to do when they grow up because their own plans didn’t follow through, this one goes out to you. For all the kids out there who wander the streets and wonder when they might get a chance to meet the parents who left them as soon as they could stand on their own two feet, this one goes out to you. For all the grown-ups who don’t yet understand that our lives are shaped by our own two hands and to rest in peace we must make a stand, this one goes out to you. For all the high school mimes who can’t make a noise, for all the football-loving girls and the songwriting boys, for all the indecisive dreamers who can’t make a choice, for all the undiscovered souls looking for a voice, this one goes out to you.