It starts when we’re younger,

this question is usually “who you wanna be?”.

It comes from the “grown ups”,

daily questioning their own identity.

Here I present a picture of my hallucinated canopy,

A dark place no doubt still marinated in light and ivory.

At first I thought, A dancer maybe?

I twirl a lot, and always skip on beats,

My heart races at every move, like being watched by elites,

My feat know the steps, my arms always stretched.

But no one will watch you, you’re fat!

Loose some and retry, when you don’t look like a station rat.

Tears. They console! “Oh! you’re pretty just a little overweight”.

and like a good girl in training, I did as they said.

Lost kilos, also dropped happiness as dead weight.

But I cannot be a dancer now, my confidence is in shreds,

I believed what they said so now any stage is a threat.

An artist perhaps? Oh I’ve got to be this.

I adore colors, in love with how we understand shapes.

This sky should be a water painting, this waterfall in oil I’ll masquerade.

Oh the mocking patterns, I always know what to create.

Haha, mediocracy finally? Still a decision is something they say.

An artist? Well, you’ve got a sad way ahead.

You see without a niche you’re too much, no sense will you ever clutch.

You won’t matter, you won’t earn, just survive long without living much.

You won’t be respected and no good will be expected.

They are wrong, I thought? Art is as true as gravity.

A language not descended in ancestry.

Still, Could I be an artist now? I ask with my genius in shreds,

One niche won’t do justice like they asked so now every color is a threat.

A writer, Aha! I’ve had empathy for long,

Love how tiny pens command mighty swords.

Good at noticing and listening, always inch-ing details,

Poems have helped me understand all the untreated pain.

But who would read you? They say.

You’re not worth paying attention to yet.

Become someone, create value, wield power only then will you persuade.

They weren’t wrong in what they said, I thought?

They noticed a pattern long at display.

Attention had a price now and poems were disemboweled; dismayed!

Value came from bravado now and this was a world of brutal trade.

Cannot be a writer now, my belief is in shreds,

I understood what they said so now any paper is a threat.

What should I be now? They say everyone’s gotta be something.

Doesn’t matter now, I’ve lost my will to be.

But, I learnt my lesson, by being torn in this tragedy.

Head this warning, mark these words-

“The voices out there are here to complain.

If you listen, like me your flights they’ll mame.”

Suppressed for a long time, didn’t know who I wanted to be.

Believed everyone I met, never discovered the unhindered, unaltered, unapologetic me.