If You Want to Make Me Mad

If you want to make me mad...

try to censor me.

Try to shrink me.

Try to control me.

Try to gaslight me.

Try to misrepresent who I am.

Try to smother me.

Try to give me advice I didn't ask for.

Try to tell me what I should think

before you've bothered to understand how I think.

Try to make my questions smaller

because they make you uncomfortable.

Try to mistake my intensity for instability.

Try to confuse my independence with defiance.

Try to put me in a box

and then tell me it's for my own good.

That will make me mad.

But here's what I've learned:

You don't get to make me smaller

just because my full size is inconvenient.

You don't get to rewrite me

because the version you've invented is easier to handle.

You don't get to silence me

and call it protection.

You don't get to control me

and call it care.

And you certainly don't get to tell me who I am

when I am standing right here.

I am not asking to be managed.

I am asking to be seen accurately.

And if you can't do that...

at least don't mistake my refusal to disappear

for a refusal to listen.

Because I will listen.

I will reconsider.

I will change.

But I will not surrender my mind

just to make you comfortable.