Frustration embodied
By monsters that fly from lips
That have seen many years.
Or, sometimes fairies that don’t fly.
Like when a man chats up my father,
Yet when I speak, doesn’t say a word back.
Like when I’m told that I wouldn’t understand something.
I’ve gone through things far darker
Than piles of bills or a fender bender.
I’ve doubted my worth and swum through black oceans
But, yeah, I wouldn’t understand a conversation about politics.
I’m “too young” to know about that thing that happened.
Yes, my body has only been around in this form for twelve years.
But my mind has endured so much more than a 12-year-old should.
My mind is not a twelve-year-old.
People whose minds are twelve spend their days worrying
About makeup, social statuses, and baseball.
I worry about why I was put here on Earth
If I’m good enough or deserve to do things.
I ponder things the racist man at the dog park
Has never even known could be pondered.
And, yet, he thinks I’m not even worth speaking to.
Children are more than things who vomit and cry.
They have feelings, and they feel them much stronger than
Any adult.
And this world is teaching them that they aren’t even worth being spoken to.
I wonder, do all the adults complain so much
Because they’ve closed themselves off from the joy only a child can bring?