Without you, I'm nothing

I am a writer because I need to remember that my father loved me enough to read to me in the womb.

I am a writer because I was reading before my parents thought I would. I was reading and I never could stop; because, all through my childhood, my best friends were my mother, my sister and a good book. I marveled at how one misplaced word could throw off an entire paragraph; and at how much I could relate to that one misplaced word.

I am a writer because my father was an English teacher('Stephanie and I , not me and Steff') and my mother told me to keep everything inside so people would like me.

Because when life handed me shit, I could always hide amoungst the words, between the pages.

I am a writer because I'm twenty-two and still check my closet and under my bed for monsters that I'm no longer afraid of. But that I used to be terrified of as a small child.    

I am a writer because I don't want my soul to be an empty place. I want to fill rooms, houses, cities, with poetry. With love letters, mystery novels, newspaper clippings; with words.  

I am a writer because a good word is like honey on my tongue. Because the word miscellaneous fascinates me with all its vowels. And so does cleave with its double meanings.

I am a writer because if I wasn't, I'd just be that raving lunatic on the corner that everyone ignores. The one who speaks of ghosts, and aliens, and 'is there any intelligent life, anywhere?'

I am a writer because my mother had God, my sister had goals, and all I had were books. Because my dad had work, my brother had me, and all I had were words.

Because I was named by a ghost and I'm one step away from hearing voices, be they angels or demons, or just plain human.

I am a writer because I worry that their words, lines, poetry, would fill my mind like weighty stones and I don't want to sink.

Because, when I write school notes, the words sprawl across the page in loose, looping scribbles. But when I write love notes, I fill pages with tight, cramped lines because a blank page is a waste and an unspoken word is a tragedy.

I am a writer because without words I am nothing.