People are not Poetry

This was sent for my birthday by Mbak Putri Minangsari.  Such a lovely poetry.

You can write for hours on hours
of all the things that you wish you could be
But the truth of the matter is simple:
people are not poetry

And I know that you wish you weren't awkward,
that sweet words could roll right off your tongue
But your time here is too short just to worry
how each single sentence is strung

It's okay to be rough round the edges
to be bruised up, and broken, and scarred
But it's not okay to let people tell you
that it's a reason to change who you are

Your hair doesn't always sit neatly
the way a poem sits so neatly in lines
And sometimes you might feel like a word
that nobody has learned to define

You might not be a star that lights darkness
or a bird that can teach us to soar
But it's okay - because you're too complex
to be crammed into one metaphor

It's okay not to know what you're doing
since your feelings don't have to all rhyme
Though a poem - once completed - is eternal,
you have a freedom to change it over time

You're much more than can ever be written
there is no title to say 'this is me'
You can't be trapped in the lines of a notebook
Because people are not poetry.

e.h.