I am a Writer

You can describe me with titles

Like woman

Or fat

Or young

Or even old

Depending on your own

Chronological position in life

You can call me poor

Or weak

Or uneducated

You can call me any number of things

Whether true or false

You can plaster me with titles

To fit into your little compartments

Which only serve

To make you more comfortable

With the world as you see it

But if you'll take the time

To listen

Or read

You can learn who I am

I shed your empty titles

That fail to describe me

But instead describe

Your perception of me

I describe myself

With the words I find

And stitch together

With a thread made of my soul

Every poem I write

Is a garment to clothe me

And warm me

Every kind note I write to my friends

Is a flower in my hair

A touch of colour on my cheeks

A sparkle in my eye

I am made entirely of the words I write

I write about flowers

To make myself as lovely as they are

I write about emotions

That both lift and embolden

And ache and wound

All to fashion myself a gown

Made from empathy

I write about my past

To shed the pain it brought

As well as to craft an armour

To shield me from its arrows

That come back

To fly at me once more

I write about love

Both the love I have experienced

And the love I have observed

All to make myself more loving

In a world that's full of hate

Everything I write about

Serves a purpose

Meant just for me

I am a writer

It's the only title I accept

But

I don't write

For anyone

I don't write

For fame

I don't write

For money

I write

For me

I write

To make me

A better version

Of myself

I write

To heal the hurts of my past

I write

To inspire myself to hopefulness

I write

To fill a void in my spirit

That nothing else can fill

Once my words fulfill their purpose

I release them

Like little birds and butterflies

Creatures of beauty and of flight

I release them to the world

I give them to everyone

Who might get something from them

As I did

Because I remember being the child

Wide awake beneath the tented covers

Flashlight in one hand

Book in the other

Nose inches from the page

Reading the way a starving man eats bread

Being transported to new worlds

Created by writers who were perhaps

Just trying to heal their own hurts

As I am now trying to heal mine