Life made me hurry,
Life made me lie,
Life made me think,
Life made me steal.
It made me hate my parents,
And try drugs for the first time,
To swear,
To fall and fail.
The world taught me to cheat,
It taught me to envy,
And run without looking back.
The world dropped me into a pit.
And made me write,
And live on the street.
It led me to forget,
It taught me to escape.
My parents taught me to play games and music,
My friends taught me to smoke and drink,
My teachers taught me to sit down and shut up,
My counselors taught me to talk and unburden.
-Naomi Ben-Harush, an ELEM alum from Coffee and Smalltalk/Hafuch Center in Safed
