Teach Me.

I’ve memorized the quadratic formula, trigonometric functions, the formula for photosynthesis, the Calvin cycle, the process of the French Revolution, how China fell and turned into a Communist country, Latin and Greek roots and a few foreign poems that have stuck with me since I was 8.

I know how to solve balancing equations for molarity, conversions into atoms, linear equations, mathematical limits, puzzles and riddles. I know how to write a synthesis essay in 30 minutes, ace a vocab test with minimal studying time, pick out the opposing side’s argument in a debate, perform CPR and the Heimlich maneuver. 

But I don’t know how to give up. Even when hope’s all gone and you don’t want to even see my face anymore. I never learned how to give up on people who were, are still important to me. I always hoped, always for the future, even when they drifted from me, I hoped one day, they’d talk to me again. With everything, I always hoped. 

But this isn’t like those times. The possibility of us even making eye contact is a sheer impossibility because I’m everyone to you now. Lost in the crowd of people you don’t care about, people you don’t pay attention to, people you don’t even acknowledge. And one day soon, I won’t ever see you again. 

Then what is left of me, but a hopeful clinging onto a past that had moved on long ago. What is left of me, if I keep hoping that you’ll turn around and stop me. What is left of me, if I don’t let go. 

Nothing. If I keep hoping, my feet will drag out, walking towards the future with my head in the past. I will be stretched to the limits, torn and scattered on this path I call my life until one day I fall into shambles.

But even then, I will still hope. Even if it destroys me. Even if I’m nothing but a shadow walking with a sign of the past, gripping it with my thin fingers, hoping to find somewhere to plant it in the fields of the future.

But I will find no place for it. The seed in my hands has withered away and what I hold is a empty, nothing more than what used to be. 

So teach me to open my hands, and place that seed where it belongs. 

Teach me how to give up without losing heart. 

Teach me how to save myself.