A Rose…
would it smell any less sweet if you didn’t call it a rose?
Maybe not. Or not at first.

But then…maybe it won’t realize its smell is sweet if,
instead of calling it a rose,
you refer to it as shit. 

Because names and words have power. 

And if I’m a rose, but all I’ve ever known, is that people refer to me as shit…
I might become so infracted by the name,
that I forget to claim my frame,
and forget to see my claim,
to the fact that I’m a rose and roses smell like roses. 

And then I could get so confused, that one day you’ll look up and see a beautiful glorious rose,
approaching a pile of shit, and asking to join the pile of shit as a fellow piece of shit.
Then everybody will point and stare as the rose becomes so covered in shit…that it now looks and smells like shit.