Poetry

Away from home with imposter syndrome
Fading far from the plight of perfectionism
Taunted by the unexplored, not on any exec boards
Sometimes struggling to just get out of bed

My roommate wakes up and runs ten miles
While I have clothes heaped in piles
And a hundred unorganized files on my desktop
Too anxious to answer an email

In constant comparison and competition
I’m not motivated by grades or majors
Student governance or unpaid labor
But paranoid I need to fit in

I walk downstairs and you are not there.

when sunlight hits foggy glass just right

prints reveal themselves, oil smeared into smiling faces

My body, mind, and soul are a solar system

Made up of hundreds of moons, millions of asteroids, and a multitude of planets

The depth of my composition largely unexplored

The sky is pale blue closer to the ragged spines of the outcroppings

Do you see me as I see myself in your reflection?

Looking down on your water that coats my skin a color I share with all 

Years and years ago 

Do you recognize me as your own?

What do you do when you’re sad?

I stand tall. 

I become like a tree: 

I plead and prod

For the answers to your hurt.

I wait, which is to say I wilt.

my grandfather knows trees

like I know the bark of his calloused hands

their leaves, their roots, their flowers

We all know what happens to the body when it reaches the end of life.