saturday

sun, snowcones, soccer

sleeping on your shoulder

can the weekends never end

and let's never grow older

ahead

the weight of the world 

keeps me in bed

your laughter//your love

lifts me up instead

chaos//fried nerves

your voice in my head

squeeze of a hand 

you keep me looking ahead

everything that makes me round

i can not be easily organized into hashtags or labels on cardboard boxes

i am am not the square, straight and even, check the boxes that apply

i am curves, goosebumps, stubbed toes, parabolas like roller coasters of emotion

stacks of books, thick socks, chapped lips, dogged eared magazine articles and bookmarked websites

i am built on the skins that i shed, reinvented myself on the stars of tomorrows and yesterdays

sliding into clean sheets, bouncing up at alarms, hot water runs down me in spirals

memories tied to songs, bones mended from brokenness, hips where my sister sits as i

wrap one arm around her, wrap two arms around myself, in self-love not self containment

because i 

                cannot

                           be 

                               contained

i am the fireworks i used to fear i am sunshine and oxygen converted

to carbon dioxide pumping blood, a million cells, fears and tickled taste buds, perked ears, messy hair 

save your boxes i will not fit. 

reminders

be generous with your kindness

and cautious with your trust

passion grows with practice

dreams set aside will rust

do not regret nor lose yourself

because of late night doubts 

you will know when the end has come

because it all will have been worked out

golden worth

We assign value to what is rare

Diamonds, silver, and golden hair

You are worthy, you are sparkling, and wonderfully unique

There's not another one like you

And no other me

IF

if i had a dollar for every mistake
i'd be making more than minimum wage
but time
            not mistakes
                               is money
when your back's against the cage

and if the crowd would fade
                                         and the lights would dim
maybe i could see who was in my corner
but with the shifting alliances of
                                              day
                                                    to
                                                       day
                                                              life
you've got to keep a clear head and shining armor

who are you

sixteen point four two years and i still don't know

know i am five feet seven inches of layers of experience 

and skin

skin and it's regenerated approximately two hundred and twenty two times

times which are fraction of how often i've changed my mind

mind and it's learning what to save and what to spend

spend and when to break and when to bend

bend when i am daughter, sister, writer, friend