The Poet X

by Elizabeth Acevedo

When your body takes up more room than your voice you are always the target of well-aimed rumors,

I’ve forced my skin just as thick as I am.

like a wet shirt on a clothesline just waiting to be worn

Sometimes I want to tell her, the only person in this house who isn’t heard is me.

and a mouth silent until it’s sharp as an island machete.

“Pero, tú no eres fácil.” You sure ain’t an easy one.

this year, it’s not about feeling unready, it’s about knowing that this doubt has already been confirmed.

Sometimes it feels all I’m worth is under my skirt and not between my ears.

Their gazes and words are heavy with all the things they want you to be.

She’s everything I could never be.

I feel too small for all that’s inside me.

but even before this day I think I’ve been beginning.

reputations last longer than the time it takes to make them.

but carries herself big, know what I mean? Like she’s used to shouldering her way through any assumptions made about her.

Every now and then, I dress my thoughts in the clothing of a poem. Try to figure out if my world changes once I set down these words.

This was the first time someone gave me a place to collect my thoughts. In some ways, it seemed like he was saying that my thoughts were important.

Sometimes it seems like writing is the only way I k...

I never told her he didn’t fight because my hands became fists for him. My hands learned how to bleed when other kids tried to make him into a wound.

But although I like to look, I hate to be seen.

Make poems from the sharp feelings inside, that feel like they could carve me wide open.

Doesn’t he know how tired I am? How much I hate to have to be so sharp tongued and heavy-handed?

what’s the point of God giving me life if I can’t live it as my own? Why does listening to his commandments mean I need to shut down my own voice?

men are the first ones to make me feel so small.

all the while feeling like this house his house is no longer one I want to rent.

Just because your father’s present doesn’t mean he isn’t absent.

It seems safe, our silence.

Sometimes I think I’m the only one trying to protect you from yourself.

“This world’s been waiting for your genius a long time.”

they’ll only develop as big as the tank they’re put into. They need space to stretch. And I wonder if Twin and I are keeping each other small. Taking up the space that would have let the other grow.

But I don’t feel so different when I listen to her. I feel heard.

It was just a poem, Xiomara, I think. But it felt more like a gift.

even that young I learned music can become a bridge between you and a total stranger.

This is a face that doesn’t apologize for itself.

I close my eyes and let myself find in music what I’ve always searched for: a way away.

He is an award-winning bound book, where I am loose and blank pages.

Sharing space, but not words.

Sometimes the best way to love someone is to let them go.”

Not every fight can be fought with gloves,

My body was a problem. And I didn’t want any of these boys to be the ones to solve it. I wanted to forget I had this body at all.

Some things don’t need words.

I want to remember your voice when I think about tonight.”

Maybe, the only thing that has to make sense about being somebody’s friend is that you help them be their best self on any given day. That you give them a home when they don’t want to be in their own.

But maybe my silence. Just made him feel more alone.

And I think about all the things we could be if we were never told our bodies were not built for them.

And I loved being her reward. The golden trophy of her life. I just don’t know when I got too big for the appointed pedestal.

I elbow him away, afraid of how my hands want to hurt everything around me.

Maybe, there are no words to say. I just want to be held.

Because no one will ever take care of me but me.

The world is almost peaceful when you stop trying to understand it.

but what about your mouth? How your lips are staples that pierce me quick and hard.