growing up,
I got demonized
for being
‘slow on the uptake,’
so to speak
for being
not fast enough
to understand
what I was supposed
to understand
in the classroom,
of classmates,
of relatives,
of strangers
I got demonized
for being
‘different,’
for not being
‘pretty enough,’
‘interesting enough,’
‘good enough,’
‘loud enough.’
I got demonized
for being
me.
Teresa Sargeant is an award-winning journalist and author. She released her first collection of short stories “Inner Demons” in October 2020. She is the author of the short story ebooks “Eve the First,” “For My Sister,” and “Sammy’s Butterflies” “A Symphony of Silence” is her second poetry collection. Her latest short story “Healing” is published on Short Fiction Break.