I’m not the same girl I used to be.
I’m no longer the butter, melting
on command, no longer the
sweet lullaby, the rain, the moon,
the stars, the cliche- I’m no longer
the girl I used to be.
I used to shrink, used to wrap my
thoughts in cling film, used to
deep frost my bravery, used to
cut away the parts of me
that I thought were too harsh.
too loud. Too unabashedly myself.
I used to use you as an excuse,
used to look for love in every
crevice I could- other people
were rooms for me to ransack,
I stripped them bare looking
for things I could only find
in myself, and I asked them to
define me- the quiet girl, the reader,
the slut, the drinker, the debater,
the smart one, the dumb one,
the lost one.
Labels were slapped on me
with the casual callousness
youth displays, and I let them be-
I used to be malleable.
I was the clay, waiting to be
moulded, the water, flowing freely
in a stream, the sun, cutting
an arc across the sky- I used
to be nothing.
I used to be everything.
And now, now I am the blade,
a scythe in the night, the fierce
roar of a wild animal, I am the
ruler of my own planet. The sun
of my own skies, not yours.
Not theirs.
I am brutal and brash- a battle cry
echoing in the sky, I am
loud, the cacophony of a city
melding into a sweet harmony, I am
what I want to be, when I want to
be- and yes, I am no longer
the girl I used to be,
because now,
now I know how to live for myself.
