Four girls sit cross-legged
On cold pitted concrete
It’s always cold here
Their rear-ends frozen
Bare ankles growing sore
Pouring over textbooks
Finishing today’s homework or
Tomorrow’s.

Hope there’s no pop quiz.
They nod
In unison
I didn’t study
Neither did I
The other two stare
At their books nonplussed
Their papers scattered, a ruler and a pen

Out of the library and into the cold arrives
The fifth
She looks about and sees
A grey curl
A long head
A heavy tail
It’s soft, someone thought, as she saw the raised leg

Which came down fierce like lightning,
A defiant, queerly polished white saddle-shoe
One of two strange shoes
That looked like no one else’s but why?
Flattened the entirety into the cold, cold concrete
The meteorite that destroyed a species of one.
Conjoined twins, now dead

There’s no way we can repair it
Can’t even peel it away
The custodian will have to scrap it off with a blade and wash it down

We laughed
All but one.

Wow your pretty why would you ever call yourself ugly?
Ill finally tell you what I’ve been trying to scream for years.
Was I pretty when I had ******* glasses, braces to fix my crocked teeth?
Was I pretty when you made fun of my freckles or when you said my waist was too big and my four-head looked like a five head.
Well now my glasses are contacts, my teeth are straight, my four head is contoured to make it seem small, my freckles are unseen under my make-up and my waist is tinnier from working out every single day.
Does the makeup that smudges when I cry myself to sleep because no boy will find me good enough make me pretty?
Am I pretty now because my clothes are so tight they could fit a sixth grader.
Or are my legs still too big, my waist still not skinny enough no matter how many hours I work out or how many miles I run.
“Maybe if you worked out more you would be skinnier” they said.
Wear that short dress but be careful just because you are pretty now doesn’t mean you get to be a ****.
They even make fun of my name. A name my loving mother gave me
“What kind of name is Anna it’s the most average white girl name ever”
Nothing is ever good enough something about me is always wrong.
Maybe I liked it better when I was chubbier and had glasses and braces because the worst people would have called me is ugly and fat.
So am I pretty now that I have trouble writing a poem that I can call myself pretty. Because no matter what the hurtful words you once put in my head are glued to my eyelids every time I look in the mirror. The words swirling around in the mirror as I try to achieve your version of perfection. What is wrong with my version?
So now I’m pretty but I’m broken and no boy like a broken girl. No one likes a broken girl who they have to help pick you pick up the pieces.
So, what’s the point of wearing these jeans that make it hard it to breath but I must wear them to show of my figure. My **** must be big, my ***** pushed up to my ears and my waist shoved into my pants.
But it doesn’t matter if I cry when they still call me names, ****, ***, fake, and still no matter what I do to try and meet their expectations, ugly.
At least I have make up to cover up my mascara tears.

They Fly Around
Spreading hate instead of cheer
They Buzz all day
Spreading gossip from ear to ear
They Sting everyone
Excluding, teasing and lying
Queen Bees
Queen Bees
Leave every one crying