Rebecca Smolen

WE DON’T OWE ANY SMALLNESS

  —   inspiration from The Independence (of Puerto Rico) by Raquel Salas Rivera

we have been birthed
and we grow in the container labeled small
we still fight 
as our mothers and grandmothers and great grandmothers did.
with each generation
we are sure to leave instructions for the next.
this container is imperfect glass
that we cannot see through—not fully.
writhing shapes pass us by,
we see colors bleed into others,
we hear mumbles of laughter, half-conversations, 
shouts that fade from us.
all of us learn to find our place in the glass jar;
where we might make out a face,
where the glass is thinnest and
we can hear more or, if we cry out,
something might hear us—
though no one lets us out.
we live in our container labeled small
some of us learn to fit nicely.
some devote entire lives searching for instructions left behind:
a crack in the glass.
we wedge any small thing into it
and use our small weight to levy
that small crack a little wider
so our small voice might seem 
a small bit louder.

Rebecca Smolen is a writer based in Portland transplanted from NH in 2014. She grew up on a dead-end road exploring drainage pipes and pond life. Now settled here with her family, she works as a veterinary technician. Rebecca is a true believer of once down in print, words are no longer for the writer, but instead are meant to support, heal or console others. You can find her writing most recently in the Unchaste Anthologies, Mutha Magazine, VoiceCatcher, Poeming Pigeon and her chapbook, Womanhood and Other Scars.