Why do you do this to yourself?
Why do you stand and ask the girl in the mirror who you are?
Why do you ask the numbers if you are worthy?
Do you not know,
They do not know
How to label you appropriately.
If you ask strangers to define you,
They will cut you up until they can fit you in the norm.
You are never just the norm.
Your mother did not stand straight
For nine months she carried your weight,
So that one day you can walk without your spine folding.
So why do you let others,
Shame you into silence?
Neither priceless nor worthless have any real value.
So who gets to decide if you are one over the other?
Why do you ask your poetry to bleed for you?
Why do you ask your art to cry over you.
Why do you lie to yourself every night?
This world doesn’t need anymore lies.
You have turned your voice hoarse
Defending people you know nothing about,
Defending emotions.
Why have you let the world turn your heart into a battlefield.
Since when have you become so defenseless?
You were not born to justify your existence.
You don’t have to prove your beliefs.
And ever time you explain yourself to others,
You let them know they have a right to those questions.
Your life is not a comprehension test to the world.
You don’t have to make sense to others
At the cost of your sanity.
So every time they come bearing tags,
Tell them you mother did not name you unique
So that they can turn you into something ordinary.
Tell them you are ballad, a song
Written in a language long forgotten.
Tell them your story is carved in stone,
In a city now lost underground.
Tell them you have built monuments
For every tear you let fall.
Tell them you can’t be loved so easily.
And that’s okay by you.
Tell them the next time they come to box you up,
You will tear apart the seams
Every time.
Amar Shobdo 