Concrete Angel

She walks to school with a lunch she packed
Nobody knows what she's holding back;
Wearing the same dress she wore yesterday,
She hides the bruises with the linen and lace;
oh

Temari always walked to the Academy with a lunch she had packed herself, and she would always make sure no one could tell what she was thinking or feeling.

She never changed her dress, not because she didn’t want to, but simply because she didn’t have another one, and since she had so many bruises from the harsh training her father put her through, she would always cover them with her dress.

The teacher wonders but she doesn't ask,
It's hard to see the pain behind the mask;
Bearing the burden of a secret storm,
Sometimes she wishes she was never born;

Her sensei, Tanya, wondered why Temari had bruises, but never asked. No one could see the pain Temari was going through, because of the emotionless mask she had trained herself to wear.

She would never tell anyone about how harsh and cruel her father was to her, knowing they wouldn’t believe her. She often wished she was never even born.

Through the wind and the rain,
She stands hard as a stone in a world that she can't rise above;
But her dreams give her wings and she flies to a place where she's loved.

Concrete Angel

Temari often felt like her father’s insults, kicks and punches during training were like the wind and the rain, always falling and howling around her.

But she stood hard as a stone, not letting her emotions show, knowing she could never rise above this abuse.

At night, however, when training was finished, she would lie in her mother’s bed and dream of the time before her father started this training/abuse, of a time when her mother would hug her and love her unconditionally.

Somebody cries in the middle of the night,
The neighbors hear but they turn out the lights;
A fragile soul caught in the hands of fate,
When morning comes it will be too late.

Finally, no matter how hard she tried, Temari couldn’t keep from screaming out in pain. She knew the neighbors could hear her screams, but also knew they would do nothing about it. She then surrendered her soul to God, knowing that by morning she would be dead.

Through the wind and the rain,
She stands hard as a stone in a world that she can't rise above;
But her dreams give her wings and she flies to a place where she's loved.

Concrete Angel

And even as she died, her father continued to insult, punch and kick her, and everything he does still seems to be like the pounding of the rain and the howling of the wind. But finally her soul rises above the pain, and she is in her mother’s loving arms once more.

A statue stands in a shaded place,
An angel girl with an upturned face;
Her name is written on a polished rock,
A broken heart that the world forgot.

-Five Years Later-

Gaara and Kankuro always came to the cemetery to visit Temari’s grave, which was an angel girl with an upturned face, so much like Temari, that stood in a shady corner of the cemetery. Her name was written on the polished rock,

Sabaku no Temari

And her heart was a broken one that the world, all except Gaara and Kankuro, forgot.

Through the wind and the rain,
She stands hard as a stone in a world that she can't rise above;
But her dreams give her wings and she flies to a place where she's loved.

Concrete Angel

Through out all the years, Temari stood hard as a stone, taking all the abuse their father gave her with an emotionless look on her face, but they could hear her sobbing herself to sleep in their mother’s bed every night.

But finally, she rose above the pain she endured everyday, and her soul flew to a place it would be loved, their mother’s arms.

She was a true Concrete Angel, always persevering, and never cracking until the very end.