My daughter, at eleven
(almost twelve), is like a garden.
Oh, darling! Born in that sweet birthday suit
and having owned it and known it for so long,
now you must watch high noon enter....
Little Girl, My String Bean, My Lovely Woman
Anne Sexton
::
Women generally lose their voices when they turn 12. I am just reclaiming mine now. Motherhood is a very interesting place for that. When you have kids, you revisit that feeling of having to be silent like you did when you were a girl, but now you are not going to be silent because you are a mom.
Jill Soloway, in an interview with LiteraryMama
::
I began to reflect upon life rather seriously for a girl of twelve or thirteen. What was I here for? What could I make of myself? Must I submit to be carried along with the current, and do just what everybody else did?
Lucy Larcom (1824–1893), in her memoir A New England Girlhood. As a child, Larcom had to leave school and work in a mill to help support her family. She was determined to return to school as soon as possible, and she did, eventually becoming a schoolteacher and poet.