Am I too loud?
Too big?
Do I inhale too deeply when I’m near you?
Do I ask when I should just say, yes of course?
Am I hard where you expect me to be soft?
Do I stand when you expect me 
to bow?
Do I move too fast,
think too wild?
Speak too openly?
Are my words sharp edges
and blunt blows?

Are you feeling 
I am too much 
to share your space?

The joke is on you.

I don’t care!

I spent a decade 
trying to hear the words in my soul.
Another trying to understand 
if your efforts to shape them
were good and right.
And another to cast you off.

I kneel at the altar 
of all things me.
I bow down to the 
voice I was gifted.
I bump into walls,
careen off course,
and never fear 
I have over stepped
over spoken
over promised
over reached.

I live in
my right-sized skin.

I claim this definitive
scale—
at this volume
at this mass.

I am allotted 
all the oxygen 
my lungs can hold.

And I will
never 
settle for less.