To All The Women Who Had The Sparkle Sucked Out Of Them

When I was young, they beat the confidence right out of me.

When I was young,
I stood 6 feet tall
I walked with swagger
and talked loud
and said what I thought
and stood my ground
felt my anger
and danced like mad
Never once stopping to doubt myself.

When I was young
they beat that confidence out of me.

Mothers would call the school
and to say the way I was wearing my hair
was ‘bullying’ their child.
What they were really calling to say was
“Who does that little girl think she is
walking around with her head held high?”

I have done this to other women, too.
We do this when we feel small.
We all grab our bitchy little pitchforks
and go for the ones that are big because they are catching
all the sunlight above us
while we are wallowing in shadows.

They beat the badass chick right out of me.

And I watched passively as my shoulders slowly
crept up toward my ears,
hips stiffened because curvy meant audacious
and I was meant to be humble.

And you have had the sparkle sucked out of you too, haven’t you?

Someone told you to “reel it in” and you listened
because they told you ”this is how you will be loved.”

But you can only be loved
when you are known
and you can only be known
when you are being unapologetically
you.

Our sparkle doesn’t always feel sparkly to other people
sometimes it feels spiky.

But when your sparkle spikes them
and they get out their bitchy little pitchforks
to spike you back, they’ll bounce right off.

And that night, as they’re laying in bed fuming
and licking their wounds
a little voice in the back of their head will whisper…
“Maybe you’re meant to be sparkly, too.”