Hide and Seek

Oh, Little One.

I wonder how on earth anyone could have

Hurt her

Left her

Ignored her

“Don’t tell her how beautiful she is”

Though she heard it at every turn

She would pull like a little magnet with her blonde ringlets and unique, stunning eyes

How much of a threat beauty can be

Was learned at the tender age of “I am”

And turned into “I’m not” and “I can’t”

How much of a threat a mind can be

Was learned at a tender age of “I think”

And turned into “they think”

The light surrounding her was snuffed out so many times she began to learn

It wasn’t safe to be seen

So she hid there

In the darkness

With lines next to my unique, stunning eyes

And those blonde ringlets turned brown

With streaks of white

I found her

She did not want to be found

So I sat with her in the darkness

Until she was ready

For her beauty to be seen

For her mind to be known

She told me of her terror

And what she’d been through

She told me what she needed

When she’d been taught it wasn’t ok

And her voice had been held so very tightly by large hands

until she learned to hold it herself

Suffocating

Stifling

Because the one who gave her life wanted her dead inside

Because those who hurt her wanted her hollowed out

Ground like a stump

Until there was nothing left to resist

Until there was only a shell left alive

She showed me what they had done

And I showed her that she survived

She could come into the light she’d never known and see

That she had grown

That they did not succeed

“Where am I?”

Turned to “here I am”

Alive

Seen

Heard

Loved