There are things that I think that I need
and things that I think I need but I actually just selfishly crave.
I don't know if it is the first or the latter, but I just want you to look at me.
Not just a passing glance, but really look at me;
see me for what I am and what I have to offer.

Look at my freckles and see more than freckles.
See the rain drops on the pavement,
the constellations and music notes.
Read my cheeks like sheet music.
Create a symphony out of those brown spots that all other men see as ordinary.

Touch my skin.
I never use enough lotion.
Do I need it?
Of course not.
My skin is softer than a mothers breast,
It can soothe you like cashmere.
It could ignite a hunger in you like the fuzz on a peach.
Take a bite.
I taste delicious
I know it.

But you don't know it.
You're starving and you don't even realize it.
You wouldn't know a good thing if it fell from heaven and hit you
square in the face.
I could be worth a million dollars,
I could be a movie star,
and still you would walk by like I am plain as a white  brick wall with not an ounce of graffiti on it.

See me.
Let me in.
Let me fill you up,
let me call you home.

I don't love my body.
I don't love the curls on my head,
the way they become frizzy at the drop of a hat.
The way they get in the way when I do my dishes.
The way that they have a mind of their own in the morning.
You call me 'curly sue'.
You pull on my brown ringlets and smile when they bounce back into place.
You like the way my curls smell when I get out of the shower.

I don't love my body.
My *******.
The way the hang from my chest like sandbags.
The way they restrict me from buying the clothes I like.
You named them.
Alessa and Alexis.
The way a little girl names the dolls that she loves so much.
Desire flashes in your eyes when I take off my shirt.

I don't love my body.
The first time you saw me naked
I wrapped my arms around my tummy
so that you couldn't see my belly.
You grabbed my arms and put them by my side,
and smirked
and said "beautiful".
I never hid myself from you again.

I don't love my body.
I hate the way my sides roll when I move.
You came home from practice,
bruised and bloodied.
You told me that your friend
tackled you to the ground
and you saw your life flash before your eyes;
you said
that my **** body
was the last thing you saw
before you momentarily blacked out.

I don't love my body.
I hate it.
I look in the mirror and see the most pathetic pile of
flesh, fat, muscle, bone and hair
that ever lived on this earth.
I waited so long to share it with another,
because I thought that this body,
this vessel,
was not worthy of appreciation.

You look at me the way a starving child looks at a five course meal.
You touch me like a homeless man sleeping on Egyptian cotton sheets
for the first time.

I don't love my body.
But the way you love my body,
the way you love my lumps and bumps and scars and flesh,
gives me hope that some day soon
I could grow to love it as well.

You make me feel things that I never thought I deserved to feel.