she was born in numbers
stored in precious journal pages and sterile medical clipboards
grew into charts and curves and patterns
and little pencil marks on the wall
to notes to keys to open doors
to years gone by to classroom scores
to plus to times to exponents
surging confidently into infinity

then one day the numbers
started getting
small

clothing sizes and grades
and things to —care enough to— do
ambition, energy, and drive
days remaining to survive
swaying on a tightrope
suspended, descended into insanity

and as she slipped one step
past the precipice
she reached up
and found

one word
and she took it in her hand
and she stretched it into a sentence
and she sculpted that sentence into a paragraph
and the paragraph erupted into descriptions and dramas, sonnets and sonatas, lifetimes of lyricism laid out before her in miles and miles
an empire of graphite and ink all her own
and following the rising sun
she ascended to
her throne