I felt safe at East Hills High School for the Arts Nobody was trying to mess with some art kids carrying around portfolios Kids with piercings and tats boys wearing nail polish and girls wearing bow ties Black kids who listen to metal and white kids who listen to trap We were weird and free— a bubble in the world that would burst open at the end of the school when we all walked out of its doors But still Ms. Rinaldi gave me hell because I didn’t fit into her definition of weird I was a different kind of weird my hair too wild my skin too dark my voice too deep my paintings too colorful my art
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the idea that you need to break (fail) the child in order to build them back up (save them)
