Annual Youth Initative Contest

Voting Decisions: What Matters To You

College Winner - First Place

States of Matter

By Nadiya White

Here.
I am here.
I was here.
I've been here.

Hear me!
See me!
I exist!
I

Am not silent.

For I am and was
The beginning,
An antithesis
To the end.

My bones paper,
My skin and flesh
A bleeding
Ink cartridge.

This is where I start,
But you will not see the end.
I carry on
Like a spoken word:

A letter,
Vowel,
Scripture,
A single element.

I persist
And I mean
Something.
I carry meaning.

Not like how illness carries a burden.
Not like how shoulders carry weight.
Not like how a heart carries heaviness.

But how history carries time,
How a writer carries a story,
How an artist carries creation.

I create meaning,
I carry meaning,
I shape and form definition
Until I become significant.

I matter.

Like how a solid remains unflinching,
Or how liquid flows through space,
Or how air is indefinite.

I matter-
And what a word
That is so hard
To define.

There's so many definitions.

Like how matter is determined by value-
Not value as in upheld morals,
But value as in lack of worth.

Like how matter is determined by significance-
Not significant as in notable,
But significant as in minor.

Like how matter is determined by
A passing comment,
Some insult that diagnoses you with insomnia,
An expectation that knows your worth more than you.

But no,
I matter.
Know
I matter

Like words,
Like history,
Like time,
Like meaning,

Like art,
Like a story,
Like air.

Like I am everything!

I exist
As a law of conservation,
For I
Cannot let a definition create or destroy me.

I am here
I've been here.
And I matter.