childhood online

I was always too incredibly embarrassed by myself

the way I looked

My body hair

the fact that I could not shut up

and when, at times, I’d see myself

in mirrors built to mock my state

I tended to console my mind

by staring at a screen

the words in foreign language

that the kids at school would never know

provided me with something 

that I never learned to share

Increasingly, I grew apart

from where I came from

still unsure

what it meant to spend my childhood

constantly online

old enough, I now look back

historicizing what I saw

the pages browsed

the flash games played

the days before the app store