shrapnel number 1

The strength of weighted words
measured for resonance
and chosen for impact
hit their mark

the armor did not hold
and the sting became a wound
where these words pierced her

It wasn’t so much that she was called a name
it was whose voice was used as the weapon
to deliver this name that became the bullet

now she spends the wee hours 
picking out shrapnel
which she is forming into bullets of her own