There is a girl
Sitting at the table
She is terribly thin
And pokes at her salad (no dressing)
With a plastic fork
Gripped shakily by slender fingers
She is thin
And has purple highlights
And purple shoes
She is thin because she was once anorexic
Starving every day
Until she was nearly a skeleton
A reminder of those malnourished children
In that country no one can remember
She eats some of her salad
And smooths down her purple-highlighted hair
And drinks her soda (diet, of course)
And looks down at her purple-clad feet
She wears the color purple
Because it stands for Spirit Day
Which honors the dead LGBT’s
She honors them, too
Because they died
And so will she
Because she has cancer
And they found out too late
Her family cries for her
Her friends cry for her
And she doesn’t cry for herself
And that’s why she’s still so skinny
Not because she still has anorexia
But because of the cancer
So she will die anyway
In just a couple of weeks
Of course, you would never think this
Just looking at the girl with the purple highlights
You would just think that she has pretty hair
And is really thin
And nothing more
But there’s a whole story
All behind a girl
With purple highlights