You're beautiful underneath, they said

But beautiful underneath only goes so far.

Beautiful underneath goes to the park with beautiful others, sits close

Beautiful underneath goes to the movie with beautiful others, shares food

Beautiful underneath goes to the house of beautiful others, studies

Beautiful underneath goes to the bathroom, examines

Beautiful underneath punches her bodacious parts, hates

Beautiful underneath hurts and beautiful underneath cries 

Beautiful underneath feeds her thighs

She feeds them starvation and feeds them empty promises

She feeds them empty promises of future meals and thigh gaps,

As if a separation of the pieces of skin that surround her bones will somehow separate her from the world where she cannot be found beautiful at all unless followed directly by the word underneath,

Beautiful underneath rips at her skin, trying to shed off that unnecessary ten letter word,

The ten letter word that could be replaced by "the way you are" and "in every way,"

The ten letter word that could be replaced by "all around"

Beautiful underneath throws food away as if throwing away what she needs will provide her with what she doesn't, it won't

Dear beautiful underneath, you're not responsible for picking up the pieces that others tore off of you in order to build their own esteem sky high

Dear beautiful underneath, you're not flabs of skin, you're not a shoulder to cry on, you're not a punching bag, you're not a thigh gap, you're not an expectation, you're not a standard, you're not a statistic, you are not a stereotype, you are beautiful.

And you are you.

Dear beautiful, you truly are.