I am not a poem
I am not the perfect word on the half-filled page
I am not the meticulously thought-out metaphor
Or made up of smiling similes
You don’t think the way that I do
I look at you and I see a novel
A dog-eared, highlighted first-edition
My favorite book
You look at me but you don’t see
I could never describe myself the way an author would
I am not an author
I am not a weary-eyed old soul,
Hunched over a cup of coffee at two in the morning
Scratching down words into a beat-up old notebook
With an enviable frenzy and a manic determination
I am not a sunset, or an ocean, or a meadow
I am not anything but bones and skin
And while that may sound poetic, it’s not
I am organic material, just like you
Our eyes are the same color
But we see the world in different shades