I believe in love more than anything.
I believe I deserve to be loved.
No one is too impaired not to be loved.

It’s true that I am loved but no one really knew me before I could talk. I lived in a world of my own where my voice was only heard by me.

Love is what most people call pity, but pity isn’t love.
Love is not caring what someone looks like or what someone is diagnosed with.
Love is seeing the heart of another person and being only concerned with that heart.
I am concerned with my whole heart about other people’s hearts. I am not concerned with pity.
Definitely not concerned with anything but love.

I learned love here and I learned to have a voice so that I could sing about love.
Calm remains my voice inside because I have inside me a voice that sounds like love.

Really love is all that matters.

- By Logan Harnisher

---

Hope

By Will Hansen

I always hoped that I would compose
Music about being free
I always hoped that I would sing
A song about being me.

Chorus:
I dreamt that my life could have meaning
I wanted to learn how to sing. 
Then one day I met hope
And learned the joy that hope can bring.

Facing facts I always hoped
That I would sing
Facing facts I love hope more
Than anything
 
I’d only dream joyful thoughts
About one day feeling free
I’d only dream I could sing love
And be who I want to be
 

---

   The Sound of Joy
   By Will Hansen

   Listen to joy.
   It sounds like music.
   It sounds like learning.
   It sounds like freedom.
   It sounds to me like my teacher’s voice.
   It sounds like the music of my voice from the tap of my finger.
   It sounds like the song I can sing with letters and my heart.
   It sounds like me.
   That’s the song of joy.

---

Photographs by Kaitlin Flaherty

Learning to be Free
By Will Hansen                               

Longing to learn inside 
In a cage without a key
I heard my teacher’s voice
Then I knew I’d soon be free.
 
CHORUS:
It sounds like music
It sounds like learning.
It sounds like being free
It sounds like joy,
Like my teacher’s voice,
It sounds like being me.
 
Thoughts of how the world was,
How it is and how it will be
Thoughts of music fill my heart
I have finally learned to be free.

I hear music when I learn
Music is only heard when you are free
I love the music of hope’s voice 
The song of joy that now fills me. 

And freedom is living in hope's voice
For anyone who loves to learn
Freedom is living in hope's voice
Now it's time to take your turn

IDENTITY
By Aiden Taylor

The interest in me started when I said my first word.  No one knew that I was me inside myself.
No one knew that I wanted love and friends.
No one knew that I loved them and gave me credit for knowing what love is.

One day, everyone will see me as I am not as they believe me to be.
Someday my voice is going to be heard loud and clear.
Someday soon no one will think I am not in here.
Someday soon the world will meet me, not the shell that surrounds my soul.

There is a me that no one knows.
That me is finally able to speak.

Hello.  It’s nice to meet you. My name is Aiden.