Here's To The

Here’s to the

By Edythe N.

Here’s to the girls who have been called so many names they can barely remember their own. Remember that it says more about them than it says of you.

Here’s to the boys who get called gay for liking the color pink. There is nothing wrong with being in love with the lipstick that the sunset wears every single night.

Here’s to the girls who wonder how many calories are in the adhesive of a postage stamp. Put your insecurities in an envelope and address it to the ocean. Let it wash them away.

Here’s to the boys who were too afraid to ask that boy to prom this year. You deserve a prom king, too.

Here’s to the girls that like girls.

Here’s to the boys that like boys.

Here’s to whoever the hell likes who they like.

Here’s to the Jenna that happened to be born a John, to the ones stuck in their bodies, unsure if this is more than indigestion. Spoiler: it’s probably not.

Here’s to the scared ones whose hands shake from all the scars and can’t hold on to their breath long enough to realize that they are worth more than a canvas for their own pain. Please, baby, you can be the artist without being the art.

Here’s to the ones who are imperfect, to the ones who know what it feels like to have your only option be to hold on, to the ones who have pushed themselves so hard that they don’t know what to pull back and relax means, to the ones who don’t have a support system like some may have a spine, to the ones who have been shattered so many times that if you held them against the sun it would look like a stain glass window.

Here’s to you.

photography by Edythe N.