I am done bowing to the weight of their words,  
done letting voices carve me into shapes  
that never felt like home.  
Their shadows stretch long,  
but I will no longer live beneath them.  

I am not here to be quiet.  
I am not here to blend into the crowd,  
to walk paths smoothed by a thousand faceless feet.  
I am here to blaze,  
to stand where the world told me to kneel,  
to burn brighter than they dared to dream.  

The storms will come.  
They always do.  
I will stand in the rain until it baptizes me,  
let the winds shred my soul to its bones,  
and still, I will rise.  

The road will bleed me,  
etching its truth into my skin.  
But my wounds will bloom into gold,  
and I will rise, forged in their fire.  

It is not too late.  
Not too late to sift through my ashes,  
to find her—  
the me I buried beneath their voices,  
the one who never stopped waiting  
for this moment to be free.  

I will fall.  
I will break.  
I will rise.  
I will rise,  
until the ground beneath me quakes with my name,  
until I am fire,  
until I am free.  

I will not just exist.  
I will carve my name into the wind.  
I will live.  
I will *become.