Shopping with girlfriends or at the hairdressers',
Flipping through magazines as I get my hair done
Page after page
of glossy perfection
Sensuous curves
and caramel skin so soft,
Image after image
Mocking me,
calling me names
One places me in
the ‘before’ selling distant dreams of a beautiful ‘after’
Dreams contained
in big bottles and labelled lotions,
My skin needs lightening,
body some tightening or,
they reveal, I
face a future so bleak-
Men’s rejection, collapsing
careers and eventual dejection
I can’t look at the mirror no
more
That image is
not me
It’s an ugly
monster I’ve created
Done with this
Frankenstein
Time to change
Throw out all
Chips and chocolates,
The cheese in my
spaghetti, sugar in my tea
Push out carbs
too-out you go potatoes
My body is in my
hands and I am its sculptor
Carving those
curves, perfecting that pout
I feel good - I must be
beautiful now!
A glance at the
magazines- a broken heart
The images look
thinner,
Eyes brighter,
lips fuller
Skin flawless
with that ever present glow
My shame burns me
Why can’t I be
like them?
I sit at the
table
Boiled
vegetables on my plate
Stuff myself and
then run to the toilet
A finger down my
throat
Out comes it all
*Flush*
Some calories
down the drain!
An evolving
competition
Me and those
calculating calories till death do us apart
Tiredness treads in now
But that’s a
good sign!
I must be on my
way
Hopes high I
head to my ally
'Mirror Mirror
on the wall- who's the thinnest of them all?'
no lies, hidden truths no more
Deep breath, eyes open and I
see
A whale
A big ugly whale
Frustration.
Anger.
If perfection
eludes me,
I must step up
my game.
Pit stop and I
pick up some pills
Now
guaranteed a fine future ahead
I take them-
1,2,3 at a time
Day after day,
week after week,
My body now starved, some pills popped,
I feel
different. My body's not mine,
Instead a dying
corpse
A sculptor’s worst nightmare
His masterpiece
shattering in his hands.
In my race to perfection, I’d
forgotten
That perfection,
didn’t exist
Not in this
world.
I wasn’t the
lie, it was the image
Starved models
make up caked,
Living lies,
Photo-shoots
then photoshopped
Altered curves
and concealed spots
Plastic smiles
then painted on
Creating a
fantasy; destroying million others
And mine.
So I take a step back and let
my body speak for itself
It tells me to stop, this
torture unbearable,
And look within
While my body starved, my
soul did too
In the pursuit of perfection,
I'd lost not one but two
The trails were testing and
it took me some time
But I turned to the one who
is perfect and he sorted it out
Cracks mended and tears
stitched
I've prayed and the answer
was lucid
To look beyond the body and
go for the soul
This I shall polish and let
shine for the world
The Creator created me this
way and so it shall remain
I'm beautiful and so are you.
A poem that perfectly vocalizes all my thoughts on the subject, much much better than I could have done with them. I love this! :)
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