19

I was four
When I discovered I could sing my heart out
My mother used to video-tape me singing
My father used to take the pictures
Because human brains, they say, can forget easily.
I was six
And I was already great at reading
I beat my classmates when it came to reading
And boy was I great at writing too.
But it was when I was six too
When I discovered I was dreadful at drawing
My teacher told the class to draw a fish and I couldn't do it
I remember crying when I told my mother I couldn't draw
I was horrified there was something I was horrible at
But then I learned no one could master everything

It was two years later, I think
When I decided relationships were stupid.
Because my older childhood friend got a boyfriend
And she spent less time with me,
while I spent more time with my books.
And once she came back to me,
she was crying and told me her boyfriend broke up with her and hurt her.
I didn't know what that meant,
so I just offered her my book.
That was when I swore to myself that,
along with relationships, falling in love and boyfriends were a stupid idea.
And then I got back to my books.
I was thirteen, I guess
When a boy told me he liked me and asked me out
I freaked out and told him no immediately
I know I hurt him but hey, I said sorry
And I still believed falling in love would be a dumb move.

But it was four years after that,
I was freshly-just-turned-seventeen
When I stupidly made that dumb move,
and fell disgustingly in love with a guy
It was, dare I say it, my first love.
It hadn't felt anything like a stupid idea at that time
Until I got my heart crushed, of course
That was when the thought of 'falling in love is a bad idea' came back
And, boy, did that thought come along with streaming tears and a heartache.
I am nineteen now
And that first love is stubbornly still there
Like coffee stains on my shirt when I accidentally spilled it
Like blood stains on my pillow the first night I ripped off my skin
And that makes me think again that falling in love is indeed a godamn dumb move.
And relationships are stupid as fuck.
And books are still my best partner.

My brain, is one hell of a place
Jumbled words and memories,
questions and answers
anxiety and imagination,
opinions compared to facts,
book world and real world,
I'm trying to build them neatly
I am nineteen now,
And I still get lost while building my mind

I am nineteen

And I swear I still can't draw
I can't paint my mother's warm eyes the exact shade of hot chocolate she used to make me
But I sing to the flow of my blood in my veins,
Noticing how every beat is a love story about God gives me another second of life
And I still sing,
but no longer in front of my mother to video-tape me,
no longer in front of my father to take pictures of me
I'm nineteen and I still feel pride in my reading habit
Human brains, they say, can forget easily
But it's been already eleven years and I still stubbornly think,
"Holy shit falling in love is a dumb idea
and relationships are stupid
and so are boyfriends"
And with that thought,
I get back to my books.