The Girl Who Became Her Own Legend Poem by Pooja Sudha

They said,
"She's just a girl."
As if that title came with shortcuts,
as if grace wasn't earned
on nights that swallowed my name.
They saw lipstick.
Not the war cries behind it.
They saw heels.
Not the climb.
I was not born with a key
I broke in.
Through closed doors, raised eyebrows,
and ceilings rigged with silence.
You call it luck?
No, love.
Its scars are rebranded as sparkle.
It's doubt kneeling at the feet of defiance.
I turned every "you can't".
into choreography.
Stepped through fire,
didn't flinch
Just adjusted my crown.
mid-burn.
So yes, I'm a girl.
But let me clarify.
I am not the soft sigh you expected.
I'm the howl of every silenced soul.
You mistook it for silence.
I am the reckoning
written in tears,
tempered in flame,
and crowned in the ruins
you thought would break me.

This isn't rain.
This is resurrection.