No More Waiting Rooms

I don't need your permission to exist on my own terms

I’m not in the waiting room

for someone to take me seriously.

I take myself seriously.

And that changed the shape of the room.

No clipboard in my lap,

no name called like a favour,

no small voice rehearsing the polite version

of the truth.

I don’t knock anymore.

I don’t hope the door opens.

I know what’s behind it,

and if I need to, I’ll build another way in.

I am not your potential.

I am not your one-day recognition.

I am here.

Already.

Don’t mistake my softness for doubt.

Don’t mistake my silence for absence.

Don’t mistake my calm for permission

to fold me smaller.

I sit in every room I enter.

Fully.

And I do not owe you

a safer version of my voice.