this castle is run by a queen
so what
if i am not what they expected?
because i am allowed
to exceed expectations,
and i am allowed to be myself;
don’t live my life to please
strangers—
i always thought it was odd that they tried to teach
me to care what others thought of me,
because it was a lesson i never
could learn;
no matter how hard i tried
it always seemed more inviting to be myself
so i chose me instead—
maybe if they chose themselves,
they wouldn’t be so bitter;
i don’t know
because i have my own life to live
and it is too short to focus on those that
hate me and always will find reason to discredit
and insult and criticize me when they can—
i am too busy becoming a legend,
they wanted a lady but that couldn’t be me;
i may like dresses and skirts but i a feminine not fragile—
look for a damsel elsewhere because this castle
is run by a queen: me.
©2022 Linda M. Crate All rights reserved.
Linda M. Crate’s poetry, short stories, articles, and reviews have been published in a myriad of magazines both online and in print. She has ten published chapbooks: A Mermaid Crashing Into Dawn (Fowlpox Press – June 2013), Less Than A Man (The Camel Saloon – January 2014), If Tomorrow Never Comes (Scars Publications, August 2016), My Wings Were Made to Fly (Flutter Press, September 2017), splintered with terror (Scars Publications, January 2018), More Than Bone Music (Clare Songbirds Publishing House, March 2019), the samurai (Yellow Arrowing Publishing, October 2020), Follow the Black Raven (Alien Buddha Publishing, July 2021), Unleashing the Archers (Guerilla Genesis Press, August 2021), and Hecate’s Child (Alien Buddha Publishing, November 2021) and three micro-chapbooks Heaven Instead (Origami Poems Project, May 2018), moon mother (Origami Poems Project, March 2020), and & so I believe (Origami Poems Project, April 2021). She is also the author of the novel Phoenix Tears (Czykmate Books, June 2018).