Youth Poet Laureate Long Beach Portfolio

Me standing next to one of my poems at the YPL finalists ceremony.

Hello! So I entered my city's Youth Poet Laureate program, and while I lost, which is sad, I am going to try again next year! Anyway, I am going to share the 5 poems I submitted in my portfolio for the competition.

Firstly, my portfolio was titled Fresh Wounds

Okay lets jump in!

Words

Words can describe me

Many words I would choose to describe me

Then there are the words others choose to describe me

I might say I’m:

Quirky

Beautiful

Pale skinned

Brown haired

A poet

With anemia

And a bunch of medical conditions no one’s ever heard of

I might say I’m:

A high-functioning autistic

That I love to:

Read

And write

And doodle

I love to:

Roller skate

Play games

Spend time with friends

And read webtoons

Yet others might say:

She’s weird

And doesn’t pick up on social cues

She doesn’t know what love is

She reads

And writes

She’s blunt

And she’s damaged

Sometimes she gets in over her head

And she loves her labels

She wants to confine herself

To be put in a box

And maybe they’re right

Maybe I like labels

And I like boxes

Because they give me

A sense of relief

Show me I am not alone

Other people feel like me

Other people avoid conversations with people they don’t know

They don’t pick up on social cues

They are misunderstood

Other people don’t understand

Romantic feeling

Or grasp their emotions

They don’t like physical touch

They are like me

And yet they are not

We all grasp at straws

Trying to find our own identities

Because we are all individuals

And no words can fully embody our character

Shalom

The picture sitting in a drawer

resting by the bed

Mother tells the story

Of her daughter or her son

My sibling

My friend

All alone

Lost

I wish they were there for me

I wish I was there for them

Shalom

I miss you

I need you

When I'm alone

I cry

For you

And for me

How can I go through life

Knowing you missed your chance to be someone

anyone

I live not only for me

But for you

What is love? ( I read this poem at the ceremony)

Love is an ocean breeze

Caressing your face

Breathing you in

Joining your whole life

Attending to you

Comforting you

Love is a goodbye kiss

An encouragement

A reminder

A hope

That you will see them again

Please don’t leave the world yet

Love is when you can come to them for anything

When you embarrass them, and they still love you

latent you think of them

When something happens

They know first

Love is when you kind of hate them

But you have a responsibility to love them

Then you get to know them

And they’re kind of awesome

It’s probably because they take after you

Love is a trickling waterfall

Always there

Never waning

Alone but never lonely

Never tired

Often overlooked

Love is isolation

An admittance

A feeling that you’ve ruined your life

But at least you’ve admitted to yourself

That you can love

Survivor (I read this one as well)

No longer can you cage me in

The chains of society have been broken

Your words no longer bear any weight

All you have done is drag me down

I was floating in a stormy ocean

A weight tugging me down

I started to sink

People stood all around me

Yet no one noticed

I was drowning

I never called for help

I tried to swim

But the whirlpool pulled me in

I wanted to fight against the allegations

I wanted to be seen for who I was

I wanted to know who I am

Yet I can’t make up my mind

I can’t decide who to be

Which identities to own

And which to leave

blowing in the breeze

For someone else to find

But now

She has survived

Against all odds

For deciding that they can’t tell her who she is

She decides her identity

She decides who she is

Now she is hated

For speaking the truth

For being herself

For drifting away

For telling society to go to hell

Struggles

All the hard things

That put cracks in my foundation

The ground shakes

I fall weakly to my knees

My vision blurry

I claw at my hair

I claw at my eyes

I claw at my skin

Pain is my friend

Pain is my comrade

The pain helps me forget

All the internalized pain

All the things people have said

All the things I have said

All the names

All the scars

Both internal and external

All the marks

All the tears

They don’t remember

It never mattered

Yet my bones have been weakened

I swallow

My cup is empty

I have nothing left to give

The world is now dry

Her cup is empty

She has nothing left to give

We are empty

We must be dead

Swallowed by the beast

Of self-pity

The need for self-resilience

The need to do it ourselves

The need to be okay

To lie and say our day was good

When it couldn’t have been worse

Who is she to spoil their day?

 So that's it! That's what I submitted for the competition! I had my creative writing teacher help me with the fine-tuning before I submitted it, which was so so helpful!