I was too tired to cook last night. I felt like falling asleep.
I drank coffee for lunch because homework couldn’t stop piling up.
My mind forgets the battles won, the dragons slayed.
All the blood, sweat and tears I had to push through to get to this point.
I get soft, thinking that I can skip a meal just this once.
Forgetting the acrid flavors that weave
together into thick coils of anxiety that stab me
in the abdomen.
Taunting me, breaking down my hopes, my wonder. My resolve.
“You’re not normal.” “How could you ever think that you can do this?”
“You’re too weak to recover.”
And then the cycle begins again.
Looking in the mirror, begging myself to love myself.
Pinching stomach fat, convinced I’m a fruit fly,
invisible and vexing.
Maybe, if I don’t eat today, I’ll be better.
I think, knowing where this goes.
“It isn’t worth it love” I try saying softly,
though that never works. The nice tone throws my
inner child for a loop.
Maybe just this one meal. My body tells me.
It won’t get me back to that place,
wheezy on the floor, no nutrients in my body.
It’ll make me desirable,
That’s all I want.
I don’t want health, wealth, or my name up in lights.
I just wanted to be desirable,
be the girl that gets the stars, the girl with the perfect body, perfect eyes, smile.
The girl with everything figured out.
It took me years to realize girls with perfect bodies have issues,
with their bodies.
It’s worse than mine.
That none of us have anything figured out.
It took me years to realize,
this system of beauty standards penalizes
everyone.
Its goal is to tear us apart.
So we don’t find the courage,
to start whispering in nail salons, spas,
and Sephoras. And start venting all the goddamn things
every woman tries to do to be
“desirable”
Instead of figuring how what we want ourselves to be inside and
out.
The system doesn’t want our whispers turning to shouts,
until we realize our exhaustion is its fuel,
and playing this stupid game is just not
worth it.