Pinch the bridge of my nose—
is it wrong,
too wide,
too flat?
Prepare your rust-covered tools,
bite into my bone,
smooth like your dream ski slope.
Whittle me down
to a shape that’s not my own.

Caress my cheeks and pry away
my buccal fat.
Strip my canvas of its natural hues,
bleach me blank
like printer paper,
as if cream is too bold
to be the base.

Take a chisel,
hack away at my jaw
until I become
the letter V.
Sew floss into my eyelids;
make them double,
open them wide—
I awaken on a table,
lights blinding,
surrounded by blue scrubs and masks.
I am prepared.

Into the copy machine,
I am fed.
I am manufactured into a painting
with no artist,
contradicting the intention
of preset perfection set by God.

Sell my illusion
to the world.
Promise the media
this is what is real!
The kind that highlights
powdered, porcelain skin,
injected with toxins,
jaws shaved and stitched.

And I wonder,
how could they be sold
to such beliefs
of symmetry?
Hide behind that screen,
the one that shields you from bacteria—
punctured with holes.
Even with a scalpel in hand,
I can see your pitiful
lie of confidence.
Your depth of malice
cuts far deeper,
while your words
fail to penetrate my skin.

Your notions
influenced my small canvas
again and again,
until my canvas was dripping with paint,
colors and shapes that weren’t my own.
And now that I grew into a mural,
I refuse to erase
wobbly lines and patchy spaces of paint.

Your view of imperfection
is simply an excuse
to reject humanity.
For there is no mankind
without the existence of a mistake
clutched onto an apple’s core,
the taste of its defiance
perpetuating to present day’s tongue.

If that is God’s plan—
intentional missteps
to inherit these traits
all by design,
what is really considered “pretty”?

If I allow you to create my portrait,
drop your forceps and scissors,

and pick up a paintbrush.
Paint every exposed pore that appears on my face.
Replicate the crookedness;
define each line
with individual, uneven brush strokes.
With every stroke you take,
paint me into your worst masterpiece.

Let it be:
unfinished—
acrylic still damp,
colors yet to be filled in.
Let it be:
flawed—
sketch marks visible,
colors unblended.
Let it be:
the signature of my existence.