Justice, injustice—
Two words with equally powerful meaning.
Two words people throw around
without really understanding.
Two words that can change the world,
that can change a life—
even for a moment.
Two words that are the difference
between a voice being heard
and a voice being silenced.
People often think justice is loud—
something big,
distant,
something that makes headlines.
And maybe it is.
People often think injustice is loud too—
something obvious,
undeniable,
spoken by confident voices
or decided in courtrooms.
And maybe it is.
But injustice isn’t always loud.
Some of it hides in silence—
in moments that seem small
to everyone else,
But stay with you
long after they’re over.
I know that.
I’ve lived it.
I used to think silence meant
There was nothing there—
nothing to say, nothing to add.
Now I know
silence doesn’t mean a lack of—
Sometimes it means there’s too much.
Too many thoughts at once.
Too many words—
stacking faster than I can hold them,
tripping, stumbling, colliding
before they reach the air.
I’ve had things to say—
important things, real things—
but they get stuck—
caught between thinking
and speaking,
like a train on tracks
that haven’t been built yet.
After a while,
You stop trying.
You stop believing your words
were ever meant to be heard.
Because people don’t wait.
They move on
before your words even reach the surface—
before they have the chance
to exist.
Loud voices—
They take up space easily.
Clear. Confident. Effortless.
The kind people trust
without questioning.
But my voice—
Mine hesitates.
It breaks.
It stutters.
It comes out wrong—
not how I meant it,
not how it sounded in my head.
And that’s all it takes
for people to decide
My voice isn’t worth listening to.
So I learned how to stay quiet.
How to rehearse sentences I’ll never say.
How to nod
while better words sit waiting,
unsaid.
How to shrink without anyone noticing.
How to disappear without leaving the room.
I’m quiet
on the outside.
But inside—
Inside is not quiet.
Inside is relentless.
Loud.
A storm of thoughts
that refuse to line up,
but still matters,
still deserve space,
still deserve time.
I didn’t need perfect words—
I just needed time.
A second longer
to say the words
I fought to form.
I just needed someone
who didn’t decide too quickly
that my voice wasn’t worth it.
Because every interruption,
every rushed response,
every time someone speaks over me—
It says something.
Too slow.
Too hard.
Not worth waiting for.
So the voice gets smaller.
And smaller.
Until it almost disappears.
But it never really does.
It waits.
For someone
to listen—
not just to the words,
but to the effort it took
to say them.
Justice isn’t always loud.
It isn’t always big.
It isn’t distant or abstract.
Sometimes,
It’s a pause.
A breath.
A choice
to wait without interrupting,
to understand instead of assume,
to listen
even when it takes longer.
Because a voice shouldn’t have to be easy
to be heard.
And if you only listen
to the voices that come out perfectly,
You’re not listening at all.
You’re just choosing.
Which voices are worth the time?