By Ava Moga, TIWP Student

her hair is straw, glistening and yellow.
her eyes are pools of soapy ocean waves.
her nose is passed down from those before
and her body is built on years of nourishment and activity.
she has felt a million different feelings
and expressed a million different things. 
her hands have touched other hands.
they’ve touched the ground,
water,
and pages of a book.
she has smelled the air after it has rained.
she has smelled cigarette smoke from a foreign country
and smelled the kitchen when her mother is making pasta.
she can’t see what she actually looks like
as the mirror in her camera is a faker.
although she knows herself on the outside is different,
on the inside she is warm,
an eternal flame that is never blown out.
no matter how much you huff and puff,
the wax melts around her and protects her
from the outside world,
inside it keeps her dignity, kindness, and courage
and she will never lose it like she loses her keys or her phone.
the grip is strong.
it will never falter,
a forever hug between herself and her morals.