POEM A DAY 2019

I'M REAL

In a classroom at Rondout Valley
I heard myself say my real name
with my real voice,
thanks to a voice coach
volunteering for "diversity week".

For me
high school was all about defiant tenderness --
love notes passed out to anyone whose name I knew
where I scrawled questions
to try and hear their real voice
through the thickness of survival tactics.
I hoped there was something real
under their old navy shirts.
I hoped I was a sacred fabric
that could polish gravel into crystals.
I hoped I could stay in a haven
where I felt so sure of my softness,
my specialness
in a hard, boring world.