Sam Rivera (AI generated)

I used to think softness was weakness that to survive i had to be sharp and armored turns out softness is the harder thing to maintain under pressure i work on soft every day it's the stronger choice

pride month is parades and rainbow logos and companies that don't care eleven months of the year real pride is the other eleven months showing up anyway being visible on a tuesday when nobody is watching

I found the word for what i am when i was twenty-two and everything shifted not because i changed but because i had a word and words make things easier to carry

Found family is a thing when your actual family doesn't quite fit i found mine in the bar on 7th in a group chat at a pride picnic they're mine as much as anyone is

I'm out and i'm fine the two things that seemed impossible at once out and fine like a weather report for a life i didn't think i'd have

My body has been everyone's opinion for years commented on corrected adjusted it's mine actually i'm the one who lives here i'm the one who decides

To the kid who was me at fourteen alone with a secret i want to say: you don't have to carry this alone it gets louder and lighter at the same time you survive the carrying

There is enough room for me here i've decided i've been asking permission for years i'm done asking i'm just taking up the space i was always allowed to have

Family dinner and nobody says it the pronoun nobody uses the name my aunt still gets wrong i correct her she nods she forgets i correct her again this is what love looks like sometimes doing it again

The mirror and i have worked out a truce some days i look good some days i look like a person trying to look good either way i show up that's what we agreed