Once there was a girl.
Taught to make herself small.
Taught not to breathe too loud.
Taught not to talk too much.
Taught never to walk with her head high, but to keep her head bowed.
Taught to fold her dreams like laundry and to never, ever take up too much space.
She is a girl.
Judged even before she was born.
Spoken for, before she even speaks.
Shut down before she dreams.
At home, they told her:
"Stay quiet."
"Obey."
"Endure."
She is a girl.
Seen for what she's wearing before she's seen for what she's worth.
They stitched their judgement and scorn into every thread then make it look like it's her fault.
She is cowed by shame.
Cut down by stares.
Judged by her dress.
Too short?
"She asked for it."
Too long?
"She's oppressed."
Too tight?
"She's a temptation."
Too loose?
"She's hiding something."
Tell me, what is the right way for her to be seen?
In skirts, they say she provokes.
In jeans, she disrespects.
In heels, too loud.
Barefoot, too wild.
It never mattered what she wore—she, being her, was always the problem.
She is a girl.
History remembers it well.
They called her Eve, and from the beginning, they blamed her for the fall.
Since then, her hands have been tied by intentions misread, laws miswritten, and tongues quick to judge what they don't even know.
And it never changes
"It's okay to dream—but she's a girl?"
"You can be anything you want to be—but she's a girl?"
"You can be a leader—unless you're a girl?"
Yeah, she's a girl, and somehow that's always an excuse.
But that girl—
She listened, and then unlearned.
She peeled back their labels and cut the strings of their puppetry, and began to weave her own stories.
She forgot the silence.
She forgot the shame.
She learned to love the skin she's in and the star she chases.
She learned that there is thunder in her voice,
And lightning in her mind.
She is not weak or small.
She is strength wrapped in grace.
Hope dressed in flesh.
She is a girl.
She is more.
She is not your silence.
She is not your shame.
She is the future.
And she is enough.
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