Poetry

Imposter Syndrome
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

My First Pride
It fills my body
Fills my body so full of light
I am almost bursting at the seams with
Joy so infectious I cannot avoid it if I wanted to

Self-Portrait
I can’t bear
To draw self-portraits of myself.
I don’t trust mirrors
And I don’t trust my eyes.
The Indelible and Invisible
Aethiopia, Abyssinia, Askum, Kush
All names thrown around by history books, by scholars
Attempting to intellectualize, rationalize, standardize
the place my parents call home

Holy Ghost
I blame you for everything –
I blame myself for even more.
I’m dumb and stubborn; you, careless.

I Would’ve Made a Better Pirate
When Little Boy spent summers at the sea

Two Breaths, Hold
“In through your nose, out through your mouth
in through your nose, out through your mouth”