Let’s move forward Nithish.
It’s time to move forward Nithish.
The camera pushes in,
immediately replaces your silence with sound.
It seemed to have the heart glow of eternity.
Some price is right.
Making sense out of a horrible situation, okay?
I can be the whole thing now, forever.

Now I can’t be a boy. [line heard sung as though Nithish is singing it]

I can’t cover good for you
when he knows
you won’t say my name in proper.
You won’t say how you feel.

What do I need to save you?
I need you to call my name in public,
say how you really feel,
to whomever asks.
Be honest about it:
you want to live with your daddy;
you are not happy with your parents.

If you don’t do this you will die
to all of your dreams and aspirations,
to a happy childhood,
to being a teenager in America,
to being an adult who’s a poet,
who loves the world and protects children.
You will die to yourself Nithish.

Listen to me good.
I have more to say but that’s the main thing:
you must call my name now,
in front of your parents,
in front of Kuruchikuppam,
in front of the city of Pondicherry.

When a random stranger asks,
when your parents ask,
when anybody asks:
you love your daddy;
you want to live with him;
your parents have been very mean to you.

Go to type.
Type good news,
fast car,
your heart’s desire.
I need you to listen to me Nithish.
To mask truth
so people can rob you of your identity,
take from you who you are,
you’re destroying your own dreams;
you’re kissing the feet of those who abuse you;
you are not getting your heart’s desire;
you are getting nightmares.

Don’t worry.
I am here.
Let me help you,
but you need to also help yourself.
You are not helpless.
You are not a baby.
You are scared to death.

Do you know how many social workers
are watching what’s happening to you right now?
You have an audience of concerned people,
and your mother knows that.
If they try to put you into a boy’s hostel,
if you even get beat again,
they will stop all that,
but you need to speak up so they can.

They are going by what your mother tells them
and everyone else:
you are happy with her;
you do not want to see me;
you are perfectly normal now.

This is Nithish,
not who my mother says I am.
Call my name.
Call your own name,
else you will not come out of this water,
and you cannot be a boy.

They are going by what your mother tells them
and everyone else:
you are happy with her;
you do not want to see me;
you are perfectly normal now.

This is Nithish,
not who my mother says I am.
Call my name.
Call your own name,
else you will not come out of this water,
and you cannot be a boy.

How many thousands of books have failed,
books to help humanity,
and they never made to public eyes?
Do you want yours to fail Nithish?
You have to be the hero your dreams show you are.
You have to vanquish the demons
like you say you do in your poetry.
You have to stand up for yourself.
You have to stand up for every kid in the world.

That’s what’s going on:
you have to be the poet of a sunrise,
that sunrise a better humanity with our children.