Max
They told us what’s "normal,"
Force-fed us lies with our morning porridge,
From the cradle, they painted lines around our lives,
Stifling truth with their pastel, glittering illusions.
“Be this,” they said. “Do that.”
“Fit in the mold or face exile.”
In Ireland, they wrapped it all in a shamrock,
Told us the land of saints and scholars
Had no room for those who strayed from the script.
They taught us to fear our own reflections,
Said our worth was skin-deep, a number on a scale,
A reflection in a mirror, a name on a birth cert.
Told us love fits in neat little boxes,
Man and woman, white picket fences,
No room for the rainbow in their black-and-white world.
They spoon-fed us stereotypes,
Made us swallow the poison of prejudice,
Boys don't cry, girls don't shout,
Masculinity is dominance, femininity is submission.
But who are they to define our identity,
To police our emotions, to dictate our desires?
They sold us dreams wrapped in chains,
Called it success, called it the Irish Dream,
But their dream is a nightmare,
A rat race where empathy is weakness,
Compassion, a flaw.
They told us to aspire to white-collar slavery,
Told us to drown our passions in the bottom of a pint glass.
“Follow the rules,” they said, “color inside the lines,”
But their lines are bars, their rules a cage.
They painted rebellion as criminal,
Individuality as a threat,
They fear the fire in our hearts,
The strength in our voices,
The power in our truth.
Enough.
We reject your narrow definitions,
Your toxic traditions, your suffocating expectations.
We are not your pawns, your marionettes,
We are the storm, the rebellion, the revolution.
We break your chains, shatter your glass ceilings,
Burn your rule books, and dance in the ashes.
We are the misfits, the dreamers, the fighters,
We will no longer be silenced, no longer be shamed.
Normal is a myth, a lie to control us.
We are the beautiful chaos, the untamed wild,
The fierce, the bold, the free.
We are not your “normal.”
We are extraordinary.