To This Day

Sticks and stones may break my bones

but words can also cut through my flesh.

When I was a kid, the school threw nicknames at me

those words, not fists, stayed in my bones.

They thought it was just a joke.

They had no idea, every tease

would build a wall inside a child’s heart.

You can’t see the scars,

but the harm is real.

Some wounds the skin doesn’t record,

but the soul remembers them to this day.