Let Me Be More Than a Name

They call me
a label—
and just like that,
I vanish.

Not in smoke,
not in mystery,
but in a tight box
of language
built to contain
what they never tried to understand.

I was a child once,
before the labels.
Before “too sensitive,”
“too loud,”
“just like your father,”
“a born rebel,”
“a nobody,”
“a girl,”
“a threat.”

And maybe I believed
in the sound of my own name then—
unbranded,
unspoiled by shorthand judgments
passed like currency
through generations.

But somewhere along the way,
the world grew restless
with complexity.
It craved simplicity—
craved categories
like a filing cabinet
craves paper.

And so
we learned to name each other
as if names could contain
entire constellations.

That one’s a criminal.
This one’s a saint.
They’re neurodivergent.
He’s old money.
She’s damaged goods.
He’s from that neighborhood.
She’s from that faith.

Even love
comes with tags now—
"clingy,"
"emotionally unavailable,"
"trauma-bonded."

We speak as if
we’re shopping
for people
on the shelf.

What is a label
but a comfort for the lazy?
A lighthouse
for those who refuse
to sail into deeper waters.

When you label me,
you stop listening.
You paste a summary
over a novel
still being written.

You confuse the cover
for the character,
the symbol
for the soul.

You think you know
because you’ve named.
But naming
is not knowing.

Knowing requires time.
Patience.
Unlearning.
The discomfort of sitting
in front of someone
who refuses
to be easy.

I do not want
to be easy.

I want
to be understood.

Labels reduce.
They flatten.
They carve away
the strange and sacred
edges of our being,
until we’re nothing but
echoes
of what others expected.

She’s a single mother.
As if that explains
the fire in her eyes,
the cracked hymns
she hums under her breath
while folding the laundry.

He’s a refugee.
As if that tells you
anything about
the poems
he writes in the dark
to keep his country
alive in memory.

They’re autistic.
As if you can now
replace empathy
with assumptions.

You labeled her “strong”
and forgot she’s tired.
You labeled him “aggressive”
and never asked
why his eyes carry
so much rain.

You labeled them “different,”
but they were only
honest.

And once you label,
you judge.
Once you judge,
you place—
higher or lower,
worthy or not,
friend or threat,
us or them.

Labels come
with cages.
Even the good ones.

“Gifted.”
“Empath.”
“Brave.”
They shimmer at first
until they turn
to pressure,
until you’re forced
to live up to them
instead of live as you.

How do we maintain
our moral obligation
to dignity
when we’ve already
flattened someone
into a role?

How can we love
what we’ve
pre-defined?

To see someone’s humanity
requires effort.
It requires
that we resist the urge
to stamp a word
onto a breathing mystery.

You are not
your diagnosis.
You are not
your skin tone.
You are not
your passport.
You are not
your heartbreak,
your resume,
your gender,
your grief.

You are
a movement
in slow bloom.
A weather system
of stories.
A sacred contradiction.

And so am I.

Let us not pretend
that we know someone
because we know
what box
they were born into.

Let us not confuse
identity
with essence.

I want to ask
how many wars began
with a label?
How many friendships
never happened
because someone said,
“They’re not like us”?

How many people
sit in prison
of perception,
punished
not for what they did—
but for what they were
assumed to be?

Language builds
worlds.
But language also
locks doors.

The same mouth
that sings truth
can spit stigma.
The same pen
that writes poems
can tattoo walls
with slurs.

So let me be
more than a name.
More than a type.
More than your comfort zone.

Let me be
inconvenient
and worthy.
Confusing
and holy.

Let me be
the person
you did not expect
but stayed to discover.

Speak to me
without a label
on your tongue.

Look at me
without a category
in your gaze.

And I promise,
I will show you
the full, trembling beauty
of being
just
human.

#Poetry #Identity #BeyondLabels #HumanDignity #LetMeBeMe #Understanding #UnpackAssumptions #MoreThanAName