Deficiently Defined

So long ago, the wind used to slash my face, turn my nose red, and make me bleed.
I never found solace in that gushing blade that strained expressions of tear-stained eyes.
Somehow, I thought someday, this feeling would give me a high, a thought of remorse,
only now I feel the wind slash my human face to the sound of cracking clay.

When I was a child, I looked just like a normal child, but when I opened my mouth
my jaw enjoyed dancing and shaking to every syllable that came out.
Curious children, as children do, wondered what was wrong with me.
I even wondered what made me so much different than everyone else.
Why couldn’t I speak just like every other kid on earth, every other human?
What sinful act in a past life have I committed to be condemned to such hardships?

We all know what kids do when they don’t understand, the humane superiority complex.
They called me names and made me feel less than human, a defective child of God.
“But, I was only a child, I was still new to life, still new to everything,” I thought.
“Why can’t I just be like everyone else?”

The years progressed and children aged, the habit of superiority grew and grew.
Their thoughts developed, their words defined who we are as people.
Yet, again was a person of my standard torn down to into an inferior category,
due to the constant strain of vocal difference.

Everywhere I went something new came up, a newer hardship that decayed my image.
Anywhere I went, I heard people saying something so articulate like an angel.
Somewhere in my mind, I wished, envied and despised every human in my mind.
Sometimes, things are just socially ingrained inside our psyches.

Years streamed by and my voice became less and less heard, more silent than others.
Friends weaving in and out of my life like cotton threads and thoughts rushing like trains.
I knew inside my mind that I was more philosophical and experienced than most people.
I have the type of thoughts that could change a mind or stir a heart colder than stone.
I realized that day that speech never defined me, but more the thoughts that backed them.

After a few location changes, and more time progressed, I left the memories of my past
inside an old cardboard box, in the back of my mind, behind the spinal cord.
It collects dust so quietly disintegrating more and more each day.

With that cardboard box boarded up, I began to think more than most teenagers should.
I thought about everything you could imagine without a stuttering thought or tone.
I came to a new school and realized that my “deficiency” defined me pleasantly.
I could be whoever I wanted to be and so I did, I changed myself with a stroke of luck
and I can say that after all this time I never regretted it.