Tell the truth, there are things I don't miss.
Fairy tales are not safe to be kissed in,
not when you're the girl with the golden ball.
Tell the truth, Mama. You weren't prepared for
me to be what we're taught to be scared for.
No one rescues the girl who was written to fall.

What to do when we don't fit the narrative?
Left out to perish on a hill,
some of us would fight our way back,
fight our way back into it,
but do not look to me to be the one who will.

Cast aside, left to peril and pain,
left to weather the wind and the rain,
thought wicked and told to "run along and play",
turns out that I'm a survivor,
took the gamble of dead or alive, or
set free in the story, come what may.

What to do when we don't fit the narrative?
Left to the mercy of the storm,
some of us would fight our way back,
fight our way back into it,
but do not look to me to crush myself to fit the form.

I am no lost child coming home.
"Run along and play."
Did you really imagine I'd waste my time
begging to come back to stay?
You thought the world would break me,
told the wild to rise and take me, so now
why should I be bothered
how you feel or what you say?

All the babes left in the wood
who don't turn out "like they should",
all the boys they call no good,
all the girls in scarlet hoods,
let your wolfish smiles be seen.
You were never so unclean as
all the ignorance that gave you
no one else to come and save you,
'cause you don't fit the narrative.
Left out of wishes coming true,
some of us would fight our way back,
fight our way back into this,
but do not look to me to cut my feet
to fit the shoe.