They told her ambition was unbecoming,

a stigma stitched into her dress

by hands that never wore it.

The boardroom smiled politely, men in cufflinks of wealth and inheritance

polished into arrogance.

Who spoke of merit the way priests

speak of miracles:

a mystery that always arrived

in their own sons’ hands.

She watched promotions float upward

like helium balloons,

the strings cut when she reached for them.

Beneath the table their shoes pressed

against her throat,

a reminder that ceilings are made of glass

and glass cuts deepest when it shatters.

Her hunger bent gravity around her.

A singularity in their orbit,

bending weight they could not measure.

The long nights stacking receipts,

the accent she learned to smooth

into something palatable,

the door that shut gently

every time she neared its threshold.

Still she rose.

Not invited, but insistent.

Not crowned, but climbing

with torn palms against polished glass,

leaving streaks of blood the boardroom pretended not to see.

And when the ceiling splintered,

it did not shower her with applause,

only shards that glimmered

as they fell,

reminders that victory

is never offered freely.

To those born outside the circle.

Her triumph bloomed quieter than trumpets,

a private euphoria,

the kind that burns behind the ribs

when you’ve carried generations

on your back and refuse

to let them be forgotten.

The market wrote her off as liability.

The gates of pedigree closed before she could knock.

The meeting minutes forgot her voice.

But she named herself whole.

She wore the stigma as fire,

the singularity as gravity,

the euphoria as proof:

survival itself is a revolution.