I don’t want to stick out like a weed in a field of wildflowers.

I want to blend, to sway with the wind,

To wear petals soft enough to be admired,

To bloom where I am expected to bloom.

But the earth beneath me tells another story.

My roots are stubborn, tangled in defiance,

Stretching deep where the flowers dare not go.

The rain does not choose where it falls,

And still, I drink as if I belong.

The wildflowers whisper in honeyed tones,

Their beauty effortless, their colors bright,

While I grow in jagged green,

A thing unwelcome, untamed,

A thing trying too hard to be something else.

But then the sun finds me just the same,

Its golden hands tracing my leaves,

And the wind carries my seeds beyond the field,

To a place where no one says—

"You do not belong."