Wide eyes

Looking towards the New York skyline

Big expanse

Of green grass fields

Surrounding

Small town, small minds

A higher population of animals than people

Confederate flags flying

Bigotry the most popular small talk

I needed to get out.

Run away

Run to New York

Promises of diversity, acceptance

Finally a place to belong

Notions of discovering new people

People to accept me

People to appreciate me

People that can look past 

Someone’s surface and history.

They say the grass isn’t always greener on the other side

And in many ways they’re right

Small minds, small lives

Even in a big place.

Place your trust in those that you think accept you

Those that you think love you

Burned, broken, scarred

Images and expectations shattered

What does it mean to belong?

A round peg in a square hole

It fits, sure

But not perfectly.

Gapping at the edges

Little spaces for doubt to creep in

What is the price you pay to find a new home?

Broken trust

Broken dreams

A downward spiral ensues

Acting out is its own chemical dependency.

Using impulse like a drug

Hoping to find meaning in that

Struggling to make a new identity

The grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

Longing for the green grass fields of the past

The loneliness you know is better than the one you didn’t expect.

Running back to what was once your home

Seeking solace in the ostracizing

That you have learned

Than this new kind

A kind that crept in 

Without you ever expecting it

The grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

This place is no better

There is loneliness here

But now it is more bitter

You knew what it felt to belong

But now you can’t go back

Cannot turn back the time and put yourself back in that square hole

Finding new square holes 

Never finding a good fit

What does it mean to belong?

The grass isn’t always greener on the other side.

Change is inevitable in growth

And searching for belonging is what the human existence is made for

Changing identities, locations, people

And a soul becomes tarnished in many different ways

Accepting that maybe there is no true right fit

That belonging is a hopeless dream of childhood

But that to truly belong

You have to be content with the places you build for yourself

That there is no “perfect fit”

For your round peg

That there will always be square holes

That you are placed in

The grass isn’t always greener on the other side

Because the green grass is something you find within yourself.