I believe in poetry, in the written word, and all that writing has to offer to the world. I believe in pushing someone to their fullest potential and inspiring youthful dreams, as crazed as they may seem. I believe in having someone tip you over the ledge and never holding you back when it comes to your potential, because you never know how far you may soar. There is beauty everywhere you look. I choose to look back at the start. The person who gave me my start. Mrs. Susan Harper. 

I often find it hard to believe in others. In their arduous efforts to please, their dutiful, continuous dedication to serve, and even in their honesty. You couldn’t convince me otherwise. You couldn’t advise me with one feverish look that to be free is to be all trusting. I wouldn’t believe you for one second. 

Who I will trust, though, are the wise. The elderly who have mindless yet enlightened stances on humanist topics and even lifetime advice that will forever render me as insignificant. There is so much I have yet to discover, to experience. There is so much I have not yet felt.

And while I could sit here and ponder aimlessly into dismal nothingness about what I do not know, we would be lying here forevermore. I am here to convince you of something, to persuade you, and hopefully, transversally change you beyond your finest limits. That is what I hope to accomplish. 

I often wonder what beauty takes the shape of. The wise deem it as timeless, the young as senselessly captivating. I, for one, would describe beauty as a poem. 

Those who know me well know that there is nothing I cherish more than the refinement of the written word. In every stance, my uninhibited prose shall nourish me, always under stricken light, and forevermore in the quaking dust. In all periods, all sensations, multifaceted and minimalist, and everywhere. An acquirer of the world. That is what writing does for me. 

If you know me well enough, you would also know that poetry is my specialty, followed by my beloved journalistic articles, gothic short stories, possible movie scripts, then of course academic writing, and maybe letters, if they have no word limit. 

Although, there is nothing more tranquil than a subtly decadent line of prose. Nothing sensational enough, nor dependent on any source of error. A word is all I desire. 

A string of a couple, and you possess a well-renowned tale. A fixated cluster, and you have a novel. A multitude, and you have, well, your lifeline. 

There shall never be a blockaded limit when it comes to the foundational structure of our language, and certainly not in my eyes, for the act is as free as engulfing oneself in wild grasses, untamed to all influence, and sustainably crafted by the limelight. There shall also never be haughtiness, as the tremble I hear after every measly ‘click,’ and the soulful twist beneath my veins lies back some 27 months, snippets of overgrown hair, a dusted, metal wire in my mouth, and a classroom. Far off into the 9th grade campus, where the needy take the form of seedlings sprouting from their falcon roots, lies a room on the left. A room that I once avoided, grew to love, loved even more, then parted with every couple of months. In between I would visit the canopying posters, Pride and Prejudice art embellishment, and find solace, frankly, between the lines of prose hovering amongst the luminance. There was something else, though. Something grander than any poem or embellished framework. There was something so distinct, so utterly honest yet jubilated with warmth that always drew me in. Something that tipped me over the ledge and flipped me sideways so I would somehow see my faults. That something was indeed a someone. My someone. Mrs. Harper. 

It’s not everyday you find a class you love, and it’s certainly not everyday you find a woman, maternal and graceful, who supports every ounce of your dreams like there is no pitiful fall awaiting at the depths of your perturbed mind. I am lucky to have witnessed it all. And the mentor beside me, well, I hope she realizes the greatest impact she has made. 

And I’m sure they hear it all the same, just like before in the golden days, back with students with bright-eyed smiles and an unspeakable youth full with impressions. But this would have to be different. Because to Mrs. Harper, I owe my life. 

There truly is nothing I connect more with than the written word, and there is no one who understands such a sentiment more than Mrs. Susan Harper. I don’t know what I would have done without her. Yes, my mind would have fiddled with social sciences and strangled itself to death with the loop of a frayed paintbrush, but seriously, considerably, I am most eternally grateful. To glimpse fate as it is is to be sentimental, but to go back a couple of years and realize how far you’ve come, well, that is another thing. 

I am only able to do so due to the influence she has had on me. I am purely able to be free of mind because I have my words to sustain me. I feel as if writing is easier than breathing, and somehow, even when the syllables tighten and strain against my arduous limits, I find it beautifully refreshing all the same. Mere passion is what it is. It leaks from me dutifully, and I would have never had any idea, no idea at all. 

I truly don’t know if a simple “thank you” will ever be enough to suffice the woman perched at the ledge, the hollowed base in which I began. I’m not sure if the surmising trembles will ever fade, especially the ones in my mind, rather than in the fingers that scribe away at this doting message. However, I do know one thing. With every word I read, with every sentence I scribe, with every congenial tear that spills from the eyes of my lackluster poetry, I am fulfilling a duty to a woman who has given me a gift. I am transcribing my thankfulness, my duty, my arduous descent which will live on throughout my legacy, which is wholly crafted on the basis of my prose. I will forever be gratuitous, I will forever be the utmost thankful, because in this world people will only listen if you have something to say. People will only understand you if you write it down. 

I thank you, Mrs. Susan Harper. I thank you for giving me life, for transforming me into a whirlwind of sophistication, and for clasping onto my hand and intertwining it with your timeless wisdom. I thank you, for you are the reason I believe in anything at all. You are the reason why I contain my passion, my pleasures, and my most unrealistic journeys that somehow feel real in the basis of a story. You are my inspiration. 

To Mrs. Harper. Thank you for introducing me to the world of writing. Thank you for holding open the door and stretching out your lifeline. The impressionable fourteen-year old girl still thinks of you now. But do not worry. She will always thank you first. Your name will always be the first one written down.