College Essays

the prompt stared at me big and bold random letters on a thin sheet of paper small and inconsequential

"What do you want to be different in your life in five years? How would you change it?"

normally i bullshit my way through these essays basic cookie-cutter answers guaranteed every year that deflect what's really in my soul but this time i was honest with myself and strangers who'd never really know me bound by anonymity

my mother found it in the mail re-sent with a letter of congratulations and i spent that night bruised and scolded reminded once again that feelings are meant to be buried deep down in the recesses of your mind kept in a box in a safe in a corner behind a locked door with cobwebs so not even you can recognize them

not put to paper