How to Hold a Girl Like Me

Do not reach for me

only when I am easy to carry.

I will not make myself weightless

so you can feel strong.

Do not confuse my willingness to bend

with an invitation to break me.

I will not fold into your palms

just to fit.

If you want to hold me,

understand this first —

I was not made for half-measures

or careful hands.

I am both soft and sharp,

a creature of tenderness,

rebellion,

and the occasional terrible idea

that I will absolutely follow through on.

Do not call me strong

when what you mean is silent.

Do not praise my resilience

when what you’re asking

is for me to swallow my own voice

to make space for yours.

Hold me like you’ve noticed

the fire behind my quiet,

the storm tucked into my silence,

the stubborn set of my jaw

when I’ve already made up my mind

but want you to try anyway.

Do not mistake my patience

for passivity —

I stay when I choose,

and I leave when I must.

It’s not a threat —

it’s how I protect the parts of me

I spent too long giving away.

I will not be convinced

that wanting more

makes me difficult.

My heart was not built

for rationed affection

or polite hunger.

I am not interested in love

that asks me to starve myself to stay.

If you want to hold me,

learn the difference

between my calm and my surrender.

One is a gift.

The other is a warning.

Hold me like you understand

I am not a puzzle to solve

or a prize to win —

I am a story with plot twists,

a creature who answers

only to her own name.

Some days,

I will ask you to sit beside my quiet.

Some days,

I will drag you into my wildness.

You don’t have to get it right every time

but you do have to want to learn.

To hold a girl like me,

you must know —

sometimes I run.

Not because I want to leave,

but because I’m terrified

that if I stand still long enough,

you’ll see the parts of me

that don’t know how to stay.

Stay anyway.

Stay when I am quiet.

Stay when I ask for too much.

Stay when I hand you my sadness

like a fragile thing —

and trust you not to drop it.

Do not hold me for the version of me

that asks for nothing.

That girl is tired.

That girl is learning

that love does not live in disappearing acts.

Hold me like you see

the whole of me —

the poet and the storm,

the tenderness and the teeth,

the girl who wants to be chosen

and the girl who will never belong to anyone

but herself.

If you cannot hold both,

do not hold me at all.