I feel as though I must write a memoir
at the age of fourteen
as the wounds are still fresh
and the memories delicate
like porcelain newly painted
and each brush stroke represents
a person I've lost, or a love I've given
that wasn't exactly
returned.
Wet paint makes beautiful
stories.

I have learned to not only wear my mask
proudly for others,
but for myself,
as method acting is an art
and I am the canvas
and the paint
and the brushes
and the dirty water
because I am everything
to me
and my everything often crumbles
after the eighth hour of smiling
and not
meaning it.

I have mastered the art of
angst.
I have related to things
not yet experienced,
and created sentences
not yet thought,
and in that sense, I am
a psychic
and my crystal ball of a heart
is cracked and broken,
but I continue to love
and tell peoples future,
because everyone seems to love
leaving.

Yes, I am a child.
I am a child that fell in love with the
wrong adult,
the child that loved the taste of
things Forbidden,
the child that reached out to
the Wrong People and learned
the Wrong People's secrets,
was caught up in the excitement
of secrets told in whispered voices,
and found that I, myself,
was the one that wasn't so
Right.

I avoid death,
but fantasize about it when I'm alone,
because I've always been one to crave
the Wrong,
the Forbidden,
the Scary,
the Beautiful,
the Ugly,
the things I can't physically touch yet I can feel
on my fingertips when I'm
waiting for a sleep that won't come
because I've stolen hearts to replace mine
but none seem to fit the cave in my chest
so big and distorted
that it seems to swallow me
inside-out,
until I'm nothing but
a fourteen year old with a story
that will fade away with time,
as most untold stories do.

I think of myself as the protagonist,
but don't all villans?
They've got their own story
and dried paint that chips with each touch
and each attempt
to put unmatching pieces together
to form a porcelain statue
that looks much different than
you remember.

My memoir will start with the words:
"I love you,"
and will end with the words,
"I'm sorry,"
because those are the things
I say
and often
don't
mean.