It seems so effortless for her:
A swish of her hips, a toss of her hair,
While I sneak like a refugee
And hope I can keep them all unaware.
Stealing into her domain,
Always the invader,
Some unsightly lipstick stain,
Like a deviator
Left to hide and to complain
That I don’t know why this life is unfair,
Which won’t get me anywhere.

I wade through pools of dirty clothes,
Past piles of jewels and layers of lace.
I drown in femininity
She casually throws all over the place.
Drowning in this lovely mess,
Too deep now to save me.
Drowning, dreaming, wishing, yes,
To pretend she gave me
Somewhere I can decompress,
As long as I’m sure I always erase
Or hide every single trace.

I only want a moment,
Nothing so profound.
One solitary moment
With no one else around.

It’s strange to think the real me
Is kept underneath, a face I must hide,
And just like poison from a wound,
I bleed out the truth from somewhere inside.
First, I peel this shell away,
All of my protection,
Every secret on display,
Every cold reflection
Staring back as if to say,
“I know who you are. I know how you lied.”
But nothing’s so cut and dried.

It’s only for a moment,
Seeing underneath.
I’ll bear it for a moment,
Stand tall and grit my teeth.
Look away.
That thing I see
Is no more me
Than the glasses, the jeans, and the shirt.
It’ll only hurt
For a moment.

And from the wreckage, from the ground,
I build someone new, not just a façade.
It’s something real, something good.
So what if a few specifics are flawed?
If these shoes are one size small,
(‘Least that’s what my guess is,)
If I’m way too thin and tall
And these curvy dresses
Don’t hang how they’re s’pposed to fall,
That still doesn’t mean this girl is a fraud.
So why should it seem so odd

That while I’m in this moment,
Nothing else exists
But being in this moment,
Where who I am persists?
I could paint
Dramatic lips
From YouTube tips
Or paint eyes to make all the heads turn.
Or at least, I’ll learn
So that I can earn
Every moment.

What if this girl opened the door
Two years before
For Carter in that ugly Christmas sweater?
But the fact is, no one could know
How things would go
Or how long I’ll keep saying, “It gets better.”
But after two long years,
I can’t let go of that mystery
Of whether those two years
That he spent dating my sister, he
Could have spent instead with me.
Someday, I’ll get away.
One day, I’ll do it right.
I’ll walk right up and meet
Some boy like him one night,
And he’ll see
The real me,

And suddenly, a moment!
All the stars align.
I’ll finally have a moment
That’s ours, just his and mine.
And the world—