I am from a place where the birds don’t chirp loudly
They are awfully afraid to express their presence
I don’t remember the last time I stood by it as home
It oppresses all that live in it
I don’t own it or represent it
I stick out like a sore thumb throbbing for change, for comfort, but not here
Not from this place.

Alien in the soil I am birthed
In the mediums of speech
Who am I between this sky and earth?
I don’t belong here I just live here, I just breathe here, I just exist here

I’m from a place as insidious as the dark corners of our minds,
As consuming as the gluttony of our greed
See, my mind is beautiful, it thrives in positivity lest it gets drowned by the vicissitudes of this place.

Iā€™m from a place where normal is scary and scary is death,
I walk amongst brain dead youth, who see not their pain, who bare tattoos of their demise

I’m from a place where, even if I scream to the collapse of my lungs, my voice will not be heard, it’s too foggy, too drowsy,too quiet in the loudness of taverns
Too crowded in the still of graveyards.

I’m from a place I escape every time I hold my pen
I read my books and look at my mother
A place where the most pain I have experienced is constantly knocking at the door,
mocking my heartbeat, taunting at flatlines.

The future here is to live past eighteen, to not bear a child before sweet sixteen,
to hope your child only ever smokes cigarettes, only ever runs from guns, and never points them to wiggle fingers in the shallow pockets of the oppressed, to seek grandeur in the face of terror, grandeur of murderous addiction, grandeur in the likes of Al Capone, Pablo Escobar and the notorious criminals this place has offered

I’m from a place where mental slavery walks and speaks
He lives in these streets, he stands in the corners and injects heroin in the last of his good veins.

I wish I could say it groomed me, raised me, handed me tools to life, allowed me friends, allowed me dreams, I wish I could praise it.
But the talent it made, it stole.
The hope it tried to give, it broke
The future it was supposed to promise it turned the lights off on

And since then, we have been sitting in the dark.