No less, no more

A declaration of selfhood and unapologetic light.

I refuse to sit still -
To stay in a box that you deem fit for me.
I am not a doll you dress up
Choose her clothes, fix her hair.
I am human -
Its my choice, my body, mine alone.

So why is that so hard to comprehend?
What I choose for myself 
Is not to everyone's tastes
But its my choice - mine alone.

Why do you feel the need to control me?
Why do you feel the need to cage me?

Well no more...

The silence I kept has become my hidden strength.

Break open the cage with the full force of my wings.
Wings that found a way to adapt, to grow
Even in the darkness.

I refuse to live in a hollow husk of myself
To dim my light so others may thrive.
Why can't we all thrive as we want to be?

Why must it be one or the other?
Why should I stop being,
Create smallness inside myself
So others can rise and look down on me?

No more silence, no more shrinking
Take me as I am, or not at all.
No less, no more.