The Hands that Keep Reaching for My Mouth

It always starts softly. A nod. Then comes the smile. And eventually— the lean-in.

And the words don’t come out like: “You’re wrong.” No, it sounds more like: “Why don’t you try it this way…”

As if what I see needs seasoning. As if my mouth is an open draft. As if the instrument I chose wasn’t chosen by fire, lineage, and long listening.

They try to talk over me with concern. Explain me back to myself with polish. Offer refinements I did not request, as if my clarity arrived unfinished.

What they really try to do is take hold of the wheel without admitting that they want to drive.

Because a woman who knows what she’s doing and refuses to ask permission to do it: She’s terrifying to systems built on guidance, correction, and quiet capture.

They want to tune the instrument because they don’t trust the sound it makes when it’s played by its owner.

But this here mouth— it wasn’t issued for consensus. This vision was not opened for committee. This instrument was not handed down for improvement.

It was chosen.

Chosen by something older than their comfort. By something precise. By something that doesn’t need help being itself.

So now when these hands reach for my mouth, I don’t swat them away. I don’t explain myself. I don’t refine.

I simply keep speaking until the room remembers whose breath this is.

What the body knows 💖

Interruption disguised as care is still interruption. Guidance without consent is still control. If you didn’t ask, it doesn’t enter your field.

My instrument is intact. My agency is not up for collaboration. The sound you hear is exactly the sound it was built to make.