5 years old;

i have heard of something called words.

7 years old;
words make up sentences. they make up grammar, paragraphs, stories, books. we learn from books.

and poetry.

11 years old;
why would anyone like poetry. my teacher needs to stop forcing words out of me.

13 years old;
i saw the world. not the world i have always seen. not the perfect, nice world. i saw flaws, so many flaws and i felt things. things that cannot be fathomed. things that were bitter yet sweet, love yet hate, happiness yet sadness.

14 years old;
what my sixth grade teacher told me to do was now easy. not forced. words spilled from my brain- wait no, heart. maybe both. i never used my pencil sharpener so much and wiped the eraser scraps off my bed so often. i realized why authors wrote books, why poets wrote poetry and why artists wrote songs and drew pictures. they were the reflection of this inevitably flawed world. a collection of broken hearts and the words of endless dreamers. the soul of the soulless.

15 years old;

everything is now poetry. everything. because poetry is both beautiful and ugly. so are you, so are the flickering stars and everything you thought was perfect.