I can't stand it!
I can hardly bare it anymore!
The way you look at me
with the hopeful glint in your tired
age-worn dull blue eyes
so very unlike my own
and tell me what my priorities are
tell me what I can and cannot do this year
whether I enjoy it or not!
I can't stand it!
The way your tone threatens my freedom
to enjoy what I like to enjoy
to be who I am!
Every where I turn another boundary
another limit!
I'm free to use whatever colour I choose
so long as I stay in the lines
and colour in one direction
and make it neat and pretty
perfect.
"Why isn't that B an A?"
I can't take it!
Trapped within the overachiever's body
but worse
confined to be she
because I'm confined in her family's standards
and income
"Gotta get those scholarships if you want a future
to go with that mind.
We don't have the money
the money
the funds."
"Be the best you CAN be!"
but worse than that
"I KNOW you can be better."
Well maybe I can't be better!
I've been the best so long
been at he top since I can remember
MVP and academic shit that'll mean EVERYTHING to EVERYONE else
but me,
and they all say
"Trish, what I'd give to be perfect
just
like
YOU!"
Come step in my well worn shoes
and know what it's like to not have a say in who you are
perfection is constantly unattainable
and I am consistantly being whipped to grab at clouds
higher than mortality.
I'll snap
and when I do
perhaps
I'll finally reach perfection
for them.

But perfectly me is not what they want so
back to the grindstone.

08/19/2003

Author's Note: Sept 2 marks the start of my grade 11 year, one year early.

Posted on 08/20/2003
Copyright © 2025 Trisha De Gracia