Dear high school theatre director,

You made me feel inferior

I didn’t know why until now

I am not a mirror

I am an ocean

I don’t reflect the stage lights back onto the audience

I absorb them

I absorb the sounds, the lights, the feelings

I don’t reflect

I don’t crack and shatter like a mirror on stage

I thrive

I warm the the Atlantic in the beating sun

I am home

I can’t act at home

So I turn from scripts and costumes to music

The pounding drums the deafening screams

As I put real passion behind each and every lyric

I am not someone’s reflection

I am not something people can see themselves in

But a vast expanse of my own

But take your mirrors

Your favorite things to look at

And parade them across your stage

In perfect, controlled order

But you cannot tame an ocean

Not a ripple or a wave

I am defiance

So no, high school theatre director

I am not a mirror

You do not see yourself in me

And that is beautiful.