which part of me belongs today?

 

Growing up, I thought people were born with their heads cocked

because that's how they've always looked at me.

Boxes... check one, check other.

People don't know.

They don't furrow between the layers like I do.

They don't switch and twitch and actively make the decisions of which... which part of me belongs today?

Which aspect of my personality will offend the least and blend the most, and work and succeed and bury the lead like a switchboard of traits that decide my fate, and I'm always an impostor?

Always lost, always asking for directions, and people point my way like the scarecrow.

Like tornadoes blowing me whichever way the wind blows.

Well, Dorothy doesn't want to play today. She's prepping for the SAT.

Just the Scantron.

The box is empty, and glaring and daring me to choose one.

Well, I'm an expert at boxes.

My whole life can fit inside it, and I've got it down to a science.

I can pack my entire identity in an hour 'cause where there's roots, there's power, but I'm all topsoil.

My blood runs like water and oil refusing to stick.

My dad's old books, read in secret nooks.

That camera that locks all my memories in a flash, saved for when my recollection doesn't last.

That lighter that sparked that fire.

All fit in a box ready to be carried from door to door.

But that's not the kind of box people ever ask for.

So many lines in the sand, so many can'ts and cans.

I see both worlds so clearly, and I skip and jump and dance and fall between, never seen.

I belong in the spaces between.

Check all that may apply.