u/Dreaming_Dissident

They graded it.

That was the first violence —

not the grade itself

but the premise:

that the thing

which came from the deepest,

most ungovernable part of you

could be assessed

by someone

who had never been

to that part

of themselves.

You learned to make for the grade.

You learned to make for the audience.

You learned to make

for the market, the algorithm,

the quarterly review

of your own interior life —

and somewhere in the learning

the first language

went quiet.

Not gone

Never gone.

J u s t waiting.

With the patience of something

that knows it's more durable

than the system currently

suppressing it.

The Unauthorized Thing

is still unauthorized.

That's

It's greatest credential

Written by Brandon R.