Does everyone really have a voice inside here?

Your whole life questioning

Whether or not

You are allowed to have feelings, too.

Because these feelings-

Growing, sprouting feelings

Are like taking the words

From every poem you could imagine,

And throwing them inside the soul

Of a typical, teenage girl.

They’re composed of

Learning that the past is not the place to dwell,

And I can’t help but think of you when the air has a lavender smell,

And is there any way for me to break out of this unappealing shell?

You’ll learn to counter all the

“What’s on your mind’s” with

‘Oh nothing; I’m doing just fine’s”,

And when these words start to sound too much like that song you listened to nine hundred times,

Feel too much like wasted energy,

You’ll learn to say goodbye to all your days spent thinking,

And soon enough,

You’ll know all the places where no one will look for you,

And which window has the best autumn view,

And finally, your thoughts and emotions can pass through,

Unnoticed,

Because that’s just the way you like it.

You’ll learn that your feelings are like

Needles; always pulling through,

And that if you would just take the time to reconcile yourself, you’d know being human isn’t really a sin.

But this comes at the cost of

Having the whole world rush through your fingertips, and writing down all these memories, and memories, and insults, and memories,

Because they can’t be kept inside forever.

And you’ll just stay writing

And fighting

And inviting

And reuniting

All your broken parts

Because they can only heal

Through self-reflection.

You can’t spend the rest of your life

Hiding underneath white bed sheets

Just because it’s better than feeling,

And it’s time to stop pretending

Because you’re no longer five years old.

Did the time really slip through your fingers that quickly?

And soon, the gears in your brain will start to turn

Just like you did from all the opportunities that welcomed your voice with open arms.

You reluctantly share your deepest secrets for the first time,

Which turns into the tenth

Because it’s not considered a crime

To not know exactly where you’re headed.

The pain can be turned into daisies

And I don’t think they’ll ever stop growing.

You made yourself vulnerable

But it’s only because you chose to share everything you had.

Actually, if you take a second to breathe, you’ll realize that you feel a lot freer now.

The words that you extracted from your heart and spilled into the ink are now echoing through every silent soul like a lullaby, in hopes that they, too, will learn to find your voices;

Just like you did.

Because these feelings-

Growing feelings,

Growing, sprouting feelings,

Beautiful and blossoming feelings,

Don’t control you like they used to.

They’re running recklessly through the depths of the universe, and there’s no taking them back now.

After all these years of holding everything in, my heart has finally been cleansed,

And it feels better

 Than I ever could have imagined.