I Am Not A Shadow

i don’t want to be someone who writes in pencil and eats too slowly and walks with eyes that are glued to the sidewalk and tops of strangers’ feet. i’ve been underwater for so long that i’ve forgotten lungs are meant to be filled with air, exhaling seems more like something found on the second star on the right, rather than a process that is meant to be done twenty-three thousand times a day. i feel like an old woman who looks in the mirror and all she can see are wrinkles and white hair and tired eyes and the absence of who she used to be. but i’m not someone who turns away from sunsets and pretends that darkness is all i’ve ever known; someone who thinks the sun will never rise again. because the sun will rise again - the words hiding inside of me will find their way out, because i cannot hold my breath forever. i am not someone who writes in pencil and erases the bits that are too honest and too imperfect and too real to claim as thoughts of my own. i cannot keep my lips pursed and hands tied behind my back, i cannot keep pretending i am shadow of who i used to be. my tomorrows hold suns much brighter than the ones that have risen over the horizons of my past; i have not reached the summit yet. there is so much more me for me to become. each day, i am new.