A Letter To Me, From Me Poem by Vonnie Postit

dear child do not worry yourself
into blue days.
the day you came into the world
it was an ordinary day,
but words with excess and extra
do not give your life weight—
in this way you are unbound.
//
dear child do not tidy the messes of your life
into perfect piles
that lay in dark corners, under an unused desk.
understand that life is produces waste on its own.
//
dear child i am sorry you see the world
through apartment buildings and artificial bee hives.
it would make your mother cry to know
how often you condense yourself.
//
dear child these are the best years of your life, but
you have been asked to carve the rules
of this world into your small hands;
//
dear child set the world on fire with skin, unbroken
and remind the earth that you, too,
are comprised of water;
comprised of trees that were meant to grow
in protection of your solid skin,
but instead it gets shaved off,
waxed off, hated and shamed.

show the earth that you have
both sun, and moon and that these
are the windows of your life,
allowing you to see
vibrance and messes.
//
dear child,
continue to shave your head in defiance,
grow your trees strong,
and remember that you
already have both the sun and the moon;
never forget it will take
millions of years
of disrespect,
of the unnatural; of misunderstanding
and abuse to break you.

remember this abuse is a boomerang.
//
dear child be afraid;
do the opposite of what they ask,
and never draw attention to yourself.

it is the mighty fish and colorful birds
who's stories can be recalled in great books.

but the young krill or small fleas
are the ones with stories like magic,
unheard, and only for them.

young child, above all,
live only for you.