Interpretation

          Ever since she was a little girl she had wanted to be like THEM. The-Girls-Who-Had-It-All, THEY were something she thought she’d never be. Thick polished lips, golden smiles, curvy hips, thin-thin-thin, beauty in all its blossom. She wasn’t one of THEM, her lips soft pink, square shoulders, crooked smile, thick hips, ugly reject disgusting go away. She wasn’t innocence-and-apple-pie one minute and then cover-girl-sex-goddess the next like THEM. She was her, quiet moody dark needy lonely writer who cried inside a mirror and had shadows as friends. She was the one who sat with purring kittens cradled on her lap, red roses in her dark hair, the one who stood in silence on the sidelines and listened while the whole world drowned in the tears that God cried. She was the one who helped you carry your third grade science project to school when you couldn’t do it by yourself, the one who remembered your birthday even though she wasn’t invited to your party, the one who listened to you sob on the telephone at four in the morning when you didn’t have a date for the school dance and you were so sure it was going to be the most embarrassing night of your entire life. She was the one who wrote beautiful poetry that the teacher would sometimes read to the class and you would laugh at them but secretly late at night you would think about them, the one who always told you that you could do it if only you tried. She was the one who walked three miles to your first football game and got there an hour early because you were so nervous and needed someone to pep talk you through it, the one who cheered you on at your ballet recital with a little homemade cardboard sign that bared your name, the one who smiled and waved at you from on the sidelines as you kicked the winning goal in your champion soccer game. She was the forgotten one, cast aside, taken for granted, the book you throw away the moment you’re finished with your school report. She was the one who was teased, laughed at, bullied for trying to help others who needed her. A crime against her was a crime against humanity, although hardly anyone saw this. Could you really look into her dying eyes and make fun of her again? Yes. Do you know her at all? Do you know that girl perfect silent good student never talking shy girl? Do you know she goes home and cries herself to sleep, her hollow eyes so pained, so different so ugly so unloved? Do you know she sits inside her shadow-friends and writes dark poetry about death, pain, rejection, lost hope, black ravens, spilled ink, dead roses so untouchable they’re not even real? Do you know she walks home and with one smooth movement, graceful as a racing deer, stabs her cursed wrists because you teased her and she can’t will away the pain? She wants you to like her, to accept her, you don’t know about her other half that you created, do you? You’re too busy looking at the quiet girl sitting silently that you don’t even see the crying angry girl with a thousand scars inside of her. You created a girl who sits in the darkness scribbling on her leg in black ink dark poetry about her pain while drawing X after X on her hands in scarlet blood with a razor while tears stain her eyes, the girl you think is a perfect student teacher’s pet with a nice family who lives in a peaceful neighborhood, this quiet girl on your soccer team who smiles a lot and seems okay with everything. She’s the same girl, the ugly monster freak you will never see and never understand and never love that you’ve created. You never noticed her, did you? She was always a piece of the background, something you would expect to be there, something that was just there. You never noticed her at all, did you? No, you never did. But can’t you see the pain you’ve caused her? No, you don’t even know. You don’t even see. You don’t even care.

          Ever since she was a little girl she had tried so hard to be one of THEM. From soccer player, a lone defender to beauty queen, something she thought she needed to become. Painting, straightening, curling, ironing, polishing, shining, fixing, why couldn’t she be one of THEM? THEY were The-Girls-Who-Had-It-All, cheerleaders prom queens drama inspired lovely beautiful THEM, pink flowers in the middle of a garden filled with weeds. She wanted to be one of THEM, boys crawling at her feet loved by crowds for your endless beauty let someone else carry your books for you. She tried and tried so much it hurt her emotionally physically mentally verbally painfully reminding her she was a loser and would never be one of THEM. She was a reject, crawling beaten from one hell to another, endless waves of hatred in her eyes, make it stop please. She wasn’t cruel and heartless, wicked and cold, breathtakingly beautiful and sparkling, a crystal flower blossom so lovely you simply must snatch it before you know it’s poisonous and lethal, your death sentence tied with a purple ribbon made of broken glass. She was kind and motherly, coaching and lifting you up until your hands brushed against the stars. After years of your lies your taunts your laughter that hurt her like the sharpest bloodstained rose thorns she became half of what she dreamt of most, except so much more and so much less. She wasn’t beautiful sin-stained glass, a fluttering butterfly, a swooping morning dove, a starlit night so breathtaking you forget to breathe. She was a storm window, a hovering silver moth, a weeping willow that sways in the breeze of angels’ wings, a pale moon whispering dreams into the ears of the forgotten ones. She was a girl that was a fire, a light, a rose, a mirror, a needle. She was the one who stood beside you when your world was ending right in front of your face, the one who took your abuse until she lay broken and dead. She was dead inside, and yet inside your heart she lived. She didn’t need anything or anyone, she was detached reclusive observant fainthearted fearless mind over heart self sufficient not aggressive unknown abstract independent intellectual she was the one who didn’t need anyone at all. She withdrew inside herself, she didn’t let anything out or anything in, she sat inside herself as a crystal wallflower and watched in silence. She wasn’t alive, but she wasn’t dead either. She wanted so badly to fall either way, she didn’t care anymore, she was already on the outside looking in, wasn’t she? She didn’t know, no one cared about her or loved her. She was the one with bitten fingernails, messy hair, thick calves, freckled arms, small lips, big muddy eyes, big toes. She wasn’t the one with polished nails, shining hair, slim body, gorgeous eyes, perfectly proportioned. She didn’t know why she wanted this so badly, a yearning so strong she could taste it on her bleeding lips. She was the one who worked so hard she almost fell off the edge of grace, dancing so close to the flames she was burning alive, gently caressing death. She wanted to be one of THEM, no matter how much pain she had to go through or how far she had to go. Hadn’t she already lost everything she ever wanted anyway? What else was there to lose anymore, what else did she have? She didn’t have anything, she didn’t want anything, she wanted to feel nothing at all. This was what she desired, this was what she wanted, this is half of what she became. She didn’t allow anything to harm her, she was a shield against the whole world, she hated them all and didn’t want any part of it. THEY didn’t know her, THEY didn’t care did THEY? No, no one cared except the little fluttering ideas that flashed in and out of her mind like fireworks exploding red and blue and yellow before sliding back into the darkness. She just shrugged everything off, little teardrops of dew sliding off her skin, sleek as black silk. She didn’t allow anything to touch her, she kept herself hidden from the whole world. Don’t touch her, she was taught that she was ugly, she wasn’t to be seen, she was the edge of the cupcake of hope charred to cinders. She was afraid of others, she didn’t want to admit that her heart was reaching out to THEM for the last time. THEY didn’t answer her though, THEY didn’t even see her standing there soaking wet and heartbroken. She decided she didn’t care anymore about what THEY thought of her, THEY didn’t know anything, THEY were just figments of her imagination. She crawled inside herself and felt nothing at all. She wrote her stupid poetry and sang her stupid songs, she wept her stupid tears and dreamt her stupid dreams about falling stars and cursed street girls breaking the evil and finding happiness under a shining lamppost. She didn’t answer to anyone, no one knew what was going on inside her head or even cared, she was safe at last from the prying world that had murdered her. She was dead, in a sense, she didn’t feel anything, not the wind on her face or the dew in her eyes or stars in her head. She didn’t feel anything at all. Why should she? She protected herself with her denial and her silence, safe from pain and injury but also kept from love and happiness. She didn’t know what she was missing, as long as nothing hurt her she didn’t care about the other emotions that everyone lived for. Who needed love as long as there was no pain? She thought she didn’t, THEY were still there, lovely and haunting her like smiling nightmares even in the sunlight. THEY followed her, taunting her still, so ugly so ugly so ugly, never ending she couldn’t make it stop. She closed her eyes and covered her ears and still somehow her silver tears trickled down her cheeks as sapphires, lovely but forbidden. Her happiness was forbidden after all, if she ever found it the whole world would end and no one would ever live happily ever after again. So, it was better this way, so much better to feel nothing at all. She suffered for the sake of humanity, she was humanity, something lost but searched for desperately. She still reached out though, to whom she didn’t know, but those who called to her in their dreams were answered. She came to them in their tears, she soothed them until they were still and a small smile adorned their lips, until she was sure they were safe. She was still motherly, diving swiftly to catch those who had fallen from the blue skies. She gave them the peace they wanted, the push they needed, the grace they searched for. She was the one they turned to, the one who was there for them, the one who stood beside them whispering encouragement in their waiting ears. They needed her, even though they didn’t know it. Would they even miss her when she was gone at last? She didn’t know, but she didn’t think so. She was the one who was lost, the missing page in the book of life, the dropped word that completes the story, the last one. She didn’t know where she belonged, but something told her that her place was not with THEM. THEY were magical, something she had given up becoming long ago. Did she fail because, in her broken glass heart, she knew she was not one of THEM? Did she know that THEY were something she was not? She was not cruel, heartless, wicked, beautiful, she was none of this. She was the one who wasn’t used to being looked at like that, she was the one who was shy and at ends with others, the one who wanted to disappear into the nothing that she felt. She was the rejected one, the discarded one, the one whose dreams were thrown away with THEIR nightmares. She was the last one, the one who didn’t need anyone, the one who had gone through more than THEY would ever have to. She was tougher, stronger, braver, she knew she was the moon eclipsed by THEM, the stone breaking the water into ripples of sorrow. She knew that she was worthless, her words nothing, the ugly abandoned girl sitting in tears in a closet. She was the one who could close her mind to the world, the one who sat at her computer late at night when she couldn’t sleep typing away her soul piece by bloody piece. She wanted to give the world something to remember her, something to remember this lonely writer with tears in her eyes and secrets that no one would ever know. Everyone thought she was perfect, they thought that she was happy and peaceful and cherished, they didn’t know she wasn’t any of this. She wasn’t perfect, she was not smart enough or too smart, not pretty enough or too pretty, not tall enough or too tall, not thin not right not perfect. She was the ugly duckling princess at the royal masquerade, so grateful to hide away her homely face she didn’t even mind the comments that were whispered behind her back. So glad to be accepted and disowned at the same time that she didn’t even notice that there was a boy looking at her like all the boys of the world looked at THEM. She didn’t notice though, even if she did she would have ignored it because she had been taught that she was ugly, that she was worthless, that boys just didn’t think she was pretty at all. She had been taught this all her life, she didn’t know anything else. Could she even have begun to think another way? Was she to suddenly accept that she was more beautiful than THEY would ever be? The idea chilled her, frightened her, turned her world inside out and then back to the way it had always been. What did this boy know? THEY had been the ones with her all her life, THEY were the ones her thoughts were formed from, he was just a boy she had met and befriended. What was lies and what was truth? Her head ached from the confusion, she was so bewildered she forgot to breathe. She didn’t need air, she didn’t need to fill her gasping lungs, she just needed the truth. Imagine her surprise when he gave it to her. He told her she was more beautiful than THEY would ever be, her eyes sparkled like diamonds, her soul was the most magical thing he had ever seen in his life, something that made him feel at home. She was frightened, excited, afraid, thrilled, hesitant, wanting to believe in this mysterious guardian angel. She ran into his arms and for the first time in her life she felt wanted. She was one of THEM at last, and yet so much more. She was a swooping nightingale with a gentle melody, a shooting star carrying the wishes of the whole world, a graceful poem diving lightly between the crystal sapphire lines of loose-leaf notebook paper. She was the one who was found, the one made of diamonds and hope, the one who laid down in pearl-laced field and smiled while she wove flowers in her hair. She was the bliss shining in the eyes of little children, the bells that gave hope to those who were without, the one who was a gift to the world. He had shown her that, and though sometimes she slipped back into the shadows of THEM, he always managed to draw her into her own light again. THEY were nothing to her now, and yet THEY were everything. THEY had shown her that she needed to be herself, she needed to dance in the moonlight instead of hiding away from it, she needed to believe in herself as he believed in her. She was the one who needed the faith of others more than the little imaginary playmates that pranced around daisies and buttercups in the meadow. She was the one who was relief, tranquillity, peace, comfort, love. She was the one who was… life.