When I was just five, I was walking the streets of Brooklyn
Oh hey, Tonianne and Gianni, Chichi and Connie. The people I called my friends.
Little did I know, my innocence would soon end. If I stayed in this dump called Brooklyn. Some of my friends, they go by the motto, “you gotta dress to impress.”
They’re drowning in an ocean of misconception
At the age of nine, I sat on a big plane, waved goodbye to the place I was born. To my memories of sitting with my dad and watching TV. To going to the city. Rockefeller center. Look at all the lights. To the glass elevator. And to the magic of the winter.
I said goodbye. With my pink bear in one hand, my mom’s hand in the other, I was up in the air, so far away from my memories
Seatac airport. My aunt and her daughter, only a few years older than me, running to us in excitement. The few memories I had of them from my periodic visits to that rainy city left me thinking that they’d always be there for us
Blood is thicker than water, right? Years later I’m a lone bird trying to find the right tree to perch on. Leaves drift from their branches and land gently on the bare cement
Just another shape in the pool of colors which penetrate into the earth
I am a fight unresolved
I am a thin sheet of ice, crushed by a polar bear’s paw in the Arctic
I am a fish out of water, trying to catch my breath
But here I am, once again, a few years later
I am a soldier that proudly shows my scars from battle
I am a roaring lion in the midst of a circus
I am a firefly in the dark, misty woods
I have shed thousands of tears, spoken millions of words
Been shot down time and time again
You’re not trying hard enough, that’s what they spoonfeed you to digest and internalize and that is how the mind becomes twisted. That’s the moment when you need to step back and say, “Woah, Woah, slow down there”
Yet, I have built myself back up again, one tiny pebble at a time
I have perservered
I have rekindled my flame
Reconstructed myself, one atom after the other
I am the outcome of insecurities telling me, You’re too quiet. Just talk a little more
I am more than just a New Yorker and Seattlite
That’s not what defines me
No
My history is who I am
My achievements are glued to my skin. They cannot be taken away from me
The point of the game is not to win
The point of the game is to do your best and get as far as you can without beating yourself up for what doesn’t seem perfect
I am the outcome of the rollercoaster I call my history
My life is a road with bumps and detours
But the only way to reach your destination is to continue driving until you find a smooth road that will take you where you need to go