Because This is My First Life

By Abena Wirekoh

This is a piece about being a seventeen-year-old. An ode to myself reflecting on the experiences of my teenage years while acknowledging some of my personal heroes.

Because I am 17 
Because I am a female who is 17
Because the nights are restless and the days too short—

Too short to live the fairytale life
Of basketball games and walks along the beach
 Of dancing on rooftops and long nights spent partying

Because the long nights are shared with lonely cries 
Cries of pain and anger for everything—Myself, school, parents, friends— 
Everyone
And hatred for the world
Filled with the tears of innocence
Bathed in racism, sexism, classism, and every other ism 
Hatred for the world that suffocates me
That binds me useless and helpless
 
So I lay awake in bed
As slow, sad songs play in the background
As I reminisce on the times of childlike innocence 
When all was bliss with sprinkles of joy 

Until the sun ascends and my sleep descends
Until my fears are romanticized away
And the echoes of darkness are colored in pink and purple hues
 
Because I am a 17-year-old Who is sometimes an adult 
And other times a child
Coerced into the role that best fits the narrative
 
When will I become an adult?
When do I stop being a child?
Is there a moment when one leaves childhood for adulthood? 
For all the troubles it brings?
And for the termination of ignorance?

Because I am 17
And I do not live a life of passion fighting for a grand cause 
Like ​M​artin ​L​uther ​K​ing dreaming of liberation 
Fighting for the freedom of my brothers and sisters
  
A life of standing my ground like ​C​laudette ​C​olvin
Of taking my place in history
Or a life of silence with my work stolen like ​R​osalind ​F​ranklin 
Plundered as my body lies beneath granite stone
 
But because I am 17 and although I don’t march for a cause? 
Or sacrifice my youth for my country
I have fought my own battles
And persevered to be here
 
Therefore my stories deserve to be heard, 
The stories of uncertainty and indecisiveness, 
The stories of my teenage years— 
 
As days whirl by, I sink into sloth 
And dreams bleach before my eyes, 
Drifting away, existing ... not living