The 'Quiet' Boy Poem by Crystal Johnson

He was always classified as ‘the quite boy’.
The boy that never spoke unless he was spoken to first.
People would judge him without even knowing him.
They would give him one glace,
And instantly slap a label on him.
They never thought to look past his heavy chains
And black fingernail polish.
They didn’t want to see what was beyond his long hair,
Or his way too baggy clothes.
They didn’t care who he was on the inside,
It was his outer appearance that they saw,
And all they cared to see.
He was the kid getting milk cartons thrown at him during lunch.
He was the kid skipping classes,
So he didn’t have to put up with the other kids’ name-calling.
He was the kid trying to make the best of things,
When his entire world was falling apart.
He was always so timid and shy,
No one ever knew how gentle and kind he could be.
He would always tell me how he was going to get out of that town.
He said he had bigger and better plans for his life.
If only he would have held on a little longer,
He would have a life to look forward to.
I guess the constant locker stuffings,
The continuous name-calling,
And the after school beatings got the best of him.
The high school boys targeted him because he was different,
They pushed him until he finally broke.
I never thought the day would come, that I would see him cry.
But, it did.
I never thought the day would come, that he would take his own life.
But, he did.
He called me the night that he died,
He told me that he couldn’t take it anymore.
I asked him why he never said anything,
And why he was so quiet.
He simply replied,
“If no one understood my silence,
Then they would have never understood my words.”
Foolish high school kids pushed my best friend to the edge,
And his only choice was to jump.
So, he did.
No one will ever know the secrets the he hid behind his heavy chains,
And his black fingernail polish.
No one will ever hear the things he had to say,
And no one will ever remember him as anything but,
‘The quite boy’.