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a space for youth writing on mental health & identity
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a space for youth writing on mental health & identity
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![]() My eyes are sunbleached; when my mother isn’t looking, I stare directly into the sun, because I refuse to deny something so searingly bold of what it begs for everyday. Everyday, reborn at high noon, I’m draped in warmth, something organic and so utterly human. It skirts on the edge of my voice,
up-skirted like a derelict photograph. With my skin pressed against the heat, I wear sunshine like a sundress, swathed in shadows and highlights, beams of light dangling from my ears. I’m beaming because I think I look beautiful. I exist like a doll in a world of red ribbons and white lace, glass fingertips and a porcelain face. I see a prince charming in every boy who will idolize my cryptic eyes yet criticize my battle cries, a mother in every aunt who will bend my fragile fingers backwards, break them into her own. The air around me is drenched in perfume, bleeding from sunbeam stab wounds. The aftertaste of secrets still strong on my tongue, and the hot, scalding letters still branded on my cheek. Zipper teeth must run in the family, pretty dolls with thin lips, pretty dolls with ragged limbs, with tattoos and birthmarks and sunspots we’ve bleached to avoid attention, bleached to avoid internal confliction, because I know all that I really am, is just a really, really overused metaphor, dying for affection. Comments are closed.
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Unless otherwise noted, all pictures used are open-source images in the public domain. Archives
September 2023
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