- Megan Glenn
Lion

Her voice never mattered
Scattered were the seeds of her thoughts when she wrote
Notes to God, notes about how she’d end it all if she had the courage
Never encouraged to be more, just to be less, she was too much
Touched, kissed inappropriately in a closet by a little girl who’d had it done to her
Referred to as “your daughter,” forever the offspring of inconvenience
You’ve probably seen this movie
I’ll be a “new me” she said on the first day of every school year
Sometimes new here, sometimes not, but she couldn’t escape herself
She couldn’t escape the wealth of insecurity that surrounded her unremarkable existence
All she could do was sit with -- her thoughts
So she wrote them down
Notebooks abounding with her innermost sentiments
Eminent was the gift that she locked away in the secret spaces of her room
She bloomed on those pages, she -- mattered
Until one day it was shattered like the glass of a vandalized auto
Her motto “whatever can go wrong, will…”
An unremarkable box, unlike her remarkable thoughts -- stolen
A million words woven from experience, gone
Wronged was this girl whose voice never mattered anyway
A gift (again) -- locked away
Until -- the day when she began to weave again
And a feeling, akin to that first, began to fill her heart
And the art of her words filled her mouth
As she spouted truth like geysers
Making liars of those who sought to quiet her
Her voice a riot to those who silenced her
And she spoke for others whose voices never mattered
Scattering seeds over them
Pulling weeds out of them
Yelling “We need all of them!”
Until a sound arose from the masses
As they practiced their unfamiliar utterances of outrage
Uncaged are those lions
And if you listen closely… you can still hear their roars