If you saw a teenage girl

Skinny lean,

Brown skin the color of melting wood

Orange eyes, dull, eyebags underneath

A turtleneck jacket, her face half hidden in the thing

Voice quiet, getting loud then ended abruptly

Eyes twitching as though she didn’t know where to look

Would you give her a dollar if she asked?

Would you trust her enough to dig into your wallet while she’s standing there, watching?

That girl is me

And my brain gave me that thought tonight

Race is an issue world wide

But I don’t think of myself as “Black”

Mostly because I don’t fit the stereotypes

That define “Black”

Smart for her age

A shiny little thing

Shy, curses of course,

But “Oh my god! You sound White!”

“Uhm…? Okay?”

My teachers look at me in a weird way

Not all, mostly only one

I don’t like him

Kinda

And there’s this short guy

We’ll call him Laughter

I like it when he pays close attention to me

When he says something funny and turns to me

When he hits my desk on purpose and turns to me

It makes my heart flutter

But then he turns away, each time

As though I’m uninteresting

And I wonder:

What makes me me?

Is it my mind My family My accent My way of speech My friends My body My actions What I love

I don’t really know….

Who am I? Why am I here?

These are questions that I wish to be answered. I wouldn’t say I’m sorrowful—I have never felt sorrow in my life. That deep dark sadness dragging you down over and over again.

So I ask again: What makes me me?

And what makes you you?