I did not write this month’s Darling Files contribution. It was written by a former 8th grader of mine. When I taught metaphor, I would share the poem, “Identity” by Julio Noboa Polanco. The poet considers the beauty and strength and courage in being a weed as opposed to a flower “harnessed to a pot of dirt.”
“I’d rather be a tall, ugly weed,” Polanco writes, “clinging on cliffs like an eagle, wind-wavering above high, jagged rocks.”
No 8th grader wants to think of themselves as something ugly (does anyone, for that matter? I often wonder if the reason middle schoolers get such a bad rep has to do with how utterly honest about growing up they are, and it makes us all uncomfortable because we’ve been trained to no longer grapple with grey matter). “But wouldn’t you rather say you’ve used a basketball then say you have a brand one new that you don’t want to use for fear it’ll get messed up?”
“Wouldn’t you rather be the thing that’s been used?” I’d say, or at least, I hope that’s what I said. That’s what I know I tried to say.
Join Rachel Nevergall and others this week, and share something you (or in my case, someone else) wrote. Tag us on Instagram (@rachelreinkenevergall, @calliefeyen) so we can read your work.
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