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I finally mustered the courage,
to wear a blouse a size smaller,

until I saw myself in the mirror,
and I heard a light chuckle
https://www.instagram.com/p/CNQR-NogTLW/
Lauren A Winscot Jul 2020
i look down at my feet,
i mean phone.
i look up at the sky,
i mean thighs.
HER beautiful curvaceous thighs are all eye can see
as i compare them to mine,
and i shout-
******* Instagram,
not this time.
I want to be unapologetic
Yet, I continue to apologize
For every difference that they see
Increases the need to compromise

From what I wear to how I sleep
Or what is deemed a healthy size
From then on, I understood
That I lived only to be described

I apologize again for my differences
Next time, I will improve my disguise
For the sake of your own comfort
I will keep putting aside mine

I look up to their condescending stares
They will never be satisfied
I escape into my solitude
I am not something for you to define

I am tired of advocating for myself
Without the support of family ties
Finding more hate in my own growth
As though I live to be ostracized

My attempts to calm my abnormalities
In order to sooth those who penalize
To make room for all of their expectations
To create another profitable merchandise

They have taught me to pursue
A personality so idealized
While they heavily persuade me
To carve a body to sexualize

Only to be rewarded with a life
Where I am only patronized
Filled with the inequalities
That are completely normalized

I retreat into my inner world
The place where I fanaticize
Of a space where I can breathe
With the encouragement to try

I am not broken, just discouraged
Of those who antagonize
Minorities and their differences
Who then live demoralized

I don't want to be given a role
With a life script to memorize
Or submit myself to a narrative
That can easily be summarized

Do not confide me to a label
Just so you can stigmatized
Those labels are not my name
I deserved to be recognized

I do not wish to be put on a pedestal
As another icon to be advertised
I only wish for your understanding
Just enough to be humanized
Valentina Piro Jun 2019
For every piece of hair swallowed by the sink,
For every sharp bone in my body that's now gotten rounder
And every flap of my soul I puked on the truth
I now kiss myself.
I kiss myself in the mirror
And merge with the reverse;
Kiss my toes for they tickle the sand,
Kiss my eyes for they twinkle like starlight.
I make love to myself in the mirror.
The world is no longer away from home.
I am my body and I am my soul. I come together: I am whole.
Alex Smith Oct 2018
I remember when I was
Self-conscious.
Sure, I still have my struggles-
Little negative thoughts navigate
Through nothingness natively out of
My mouth.
But, sometimes I like to think
I am the greatest.
Sometimes, I like what I do.
Through and through,
I try to keep this thought true,
Take something I learned and
Share it with you.
I feel new,
Just sometimes.
As if I am not who I was back then.
As if depression never took me,
And if social anxiety
Was a construct of pseudoscience.
Sometimes I feel stronger,
As if I can take on the world;
By my own hero,
And save the ones I love.
Sometimes, I feel the sunshine
And the weight lift from my shoulder.
The older
I get, the longer it stays.
I am getting better,
Or maybe I was never
Ill in the first place.
I can do things
Other cannot,
But also learn from those same people.
I can grow as me-
Stop the burning and cutting
And constant lonely late night crying.
I am free to be balanced
And to be me
And happy.
Sometimes, just sometimes,
I get a glimpse of the time if those moments
Became my everytime.
And then I smile, and breathe
Just breathe.
And continue to think of myself
As broken, but still beautiful
Cynthia Montano Sep 2018
My life has changed immensely ever since my childhood. Even though I always see positivity in change due to the lessons I’ve learned, I feel as though some changes I have made are ones I’m not necessarily proud of. Body image never seemed to be important to me.

When I was a toddler, I felt completely confident about myself because I use to dress up and show off with the stuff that I wore. As I got older, I realized that being “beautiful” wasn’t what I was because in a past relationship I was with someone who made me feel like I was not good enough. He had so many expectations about what I should be and that just wasn’t who I was. I wasn’t comfortable because I tried to be “beautiful” for someone else instead of myself. The more I thought I wasn’t “beautiful”, the more I felt very insecure about myself . In society today, “beautiful” is defined as women who have a good figure, perfect teeth, perfect everything and so on.

I’ve always caught myself comparing myself to other girls and I wouldn’t understand why. I’ve put myself down because I thought I wasn’t good enough or attractive enough, but what I want for others to get out from this is. No matter how you look, no matter what you wear, and no matter what you weigh. You’ll always be beautiful in your own way. Everybody should love who they are as they are because a part of being unique is just being different. Instead of looking exactly like everyone else. The reason why I want everybody to feel good about themselves is so they won’t struggle each and everyday with worrying about how they may look. Nobody should ever live a life full of worry or stress just because they don’t look the way society expects them to look.

What I want others to think about is rather you’re a boy or girl, Why can’t you completely accept yourself as you are? What is stopping you from loving yourself? I feel as though it’s hard for someone to completely accept their self as they are because they are used to being told how they should look, being on social media, and looking at images of certain people. What is stopping someone from loving their self is when they point out the things they don’t like about themselves, and can’t seem to take their mind completely off of it. Though, at the end of the day I feel that you shouldn’t be beautiful for anybody else but yourself.
mjad Jan 2018
I had a talk with myself in the shower
It was a long overdue conversation
The suds of the shampoo blurred my vision
And they seemed to cloud my thoughts too
If he came back would you be strong?
Would you hold your hard-earned place?
Or would you break down like a house of cards?
Shattering your emotions like a China vase?
I would be the independent girl I am getting to know
The girl I see clearer in the mirror everyday
The one that would tell him to leave me alone and go his own way
He had his chance now I'm taken
By someone who loves me for everything
Who sees my flaws and embraces them
Not notices and demeans them
I am taken by myself.
A better long awaited self.
I turned the water off and stepped out,
Cleansed in more ways than one.
i am over him and the freedom is oh so liberating
ve Jun 2017
if i was an artist,
i would have painted myself a set of beautiful eyes,
a glowing skin,
hair of a princess,
an hourglass looking body,
a pretty version of me.

if i was an artist,
i would have drawn myself with plumper lips,
a pair of longer legs,
a better version of what i saw in the magazines

but i am not,
so i will just settle with
this

with who i am
instead of who i wanted to be
Dust Bowl May 2016
You are an oasis of rivers
in a barren desert,
The last signs of life,
The remains of a comet
Evaporated in the sun.
You are shattered cords
And spilled ink,
Gloriously painted across broken wires
Split at the seams,
But still breathing.
You are breathing.
So learn to love it.
Though I love the body positive movement, I almost never see posts about spider veins. So I decided to write my own, romanticize your beautiful, blue calligraphy like mad!
A Mar 2016
I  am facing yet another war, and I know you are too.
So please know,
This battle is worth fighting for you.
I rather be loved by the outcasted,
Then to be hated by the royalty.
But I will always be a princess suited in metal armor.

I promise to hold your hand and clense you of your wounds,
I promise to always listen,  validate, and accept you no matter what weight, age, color, size, sexuality or diagnosis.
I promise to always fight for your safe haven to become the world you live in.

Even if you do not think you are worth it,

I always will.


Equality for all,
Or equality for none.
III
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