You hate your lips
But you've never been on the receiving end of shy smiles and bitten lips
Or soft kisses leaving trails of sparks across my shoulders
(I'm convinced that's where my freckles come from)
Of whispers against skin and cheek-splitting grins and pouts.

You hate your eyes
But you've never seen them light up when you see a puppy in the park
Or sparkle like stars at that old couple holding hands
You've never seen them fill with tears, brimming, overflowing, at corny movies and dying flowers and tacky gifts that keep you sane.

You hate your hands
Because you focus too much on the past
On the criss-crossing scars that cover the backs of them
On the things they've done that you wish they hadn't.
You haven't felt them the way I have,
Soft and warm in my own
A comfort, a prayer, an anchor.
You haven't felt them brushing hair away from your forehead when you're ill
Tracing absent-minded patterns on exposed skin.
Haven't seen them from my point of view on Sunday mornings;
Frostbitten and blue tipped, holding steaming cups of tea from the kiosk on the corner, despite the subzero temperatures and your lack of a coat.

Your cheeks grow rosy at the slightest provocation and you hate it because you feel it gives you away too easily.

You have a scar above your eyebrow from a teenage piercing mistake and you hate it, calling it physical evidence of your stupidity.
You say you have a lot of physical evidence of your stupidity.

You have a birthmark covering your left arm and you hate how it makes you look "disproportionate" "distorted" "lopsided".

(You never believe me when I tell you how beautiful you are and I hate it)