by Leyna Rynearson
Before I became the best,
villainy was kind of a boy’s club,
and the club
was kind of lame.
Magneto wears a bucket on his head.
Pinky or the Brain?
I’m still not sure who was the idiot.
Hannibal Lecter wants to eat my… dust,
and Professor Moriarity only had to outsmart
Sherlock Holmes,
but there are generations of gumshoes
who cut their teeth trying to
track me down.
Everyone wants to know,
where IS
Carmen Sandiego?
The short answer is,
I am anywhere I want to be.
If you aren’t rich or sexy,
there are people in this world who will tell you
all about the beautiful experiences
they deem you unworthy of,
like value is created by anything better than a brain.
Once I learned
that every great monument seems to look better
with my name on it,
it was then that I knew
I was priceless,
because it was then that I said
I was priceless.
I was a catapult
that would direct its own trajectory.
I didn’t need anyone’s permission
to be surrounded
by greatness.
My mother used to tell me,
Mi viajera,
be in charge of your own momentum.
Mi pájara,
you are the only thing in your way,
and now,
I am the CEO of the Villains International League of Evil.
I am the most successful detective and thief
ACME has ever seen.
I have stolen the bulls from Pamplona,
the salt from the Dead Sea,
the whole Mekong River,
and every last drop of salsa in the world,
but still,
I find myself needing more and feeling restless.
My henchmen are always whining,
Carmen,
we ain’t makin’ any money stealin’
the Strait of Magellan,
but they won’t get it through their thick skulls,
the best part of taking is the challenge,
is knowing this thing that everyone wants
was least of all supposed to be mine
but I have it anyway.
The only actual thing I have ever craved
was the ability to do what I want.
Power is the ability to do
what you want.
They don’t give power to little poor girls,
we have to learn to steal it.
When I believed what the world told me I was,
I was set for a life of never getting what I wanted,
but things are changing.
I’m taking charge of the adventure,
absconding with the things you find most sacred,
most necessary and celebrated,
leaving you to ask only,
where
in the world
did she go?