You Hold the Stars Up in the Night Sky

This is for the girls who lie awake at night,

Pulling at the blankets to keep them warm,

Drenched in sins of deprecation,

Tossing and turning on their twin sized beds,

Because there is not enough room to fit expectations,

let alone their own. 

 

This is for the girls who stare at themselves in front of their mirrors,

Pinching at the extra layers of skin that hang around their tummies,

Rolls of “fat” as they call it, I prefer the term “beauty.”

 

This is for the girls who have shoulders and backs plastered in scars,

from the bras that were one cup too small, overly adjusted and tightened straps,

to push their breasts up so that boys may find them attractive enough to look underneath the surface, because who would ever love a monster? 

 

This is for the girls who fall prey to the fallacies of magazine stands,

Captivated by the bold letters bleeding off the covers:

“Three hundred, sixty five ways to style your hair!”

“How to get the perfect butt!”

“Turn the lights off to look good naked!”

“How to make him love you.”

 

Pull apart the flesh, look beneath your skin,

You are is not defined by the number of eyes that manifest lust towards you,

You are not the hands that plead to saunter their way towards your hips,

You are not the number of inches that space out your thighs,

Or the visibility of the muscles that line up on your stomach.

 

You do not need to look good naked,

Don’t turn off the lights,

Your butt looks fine,

Stop falling victim to the media,

To the photoshopped ads of puppets who look nothing like you,

Because you are real

And if you want a man to love you, he must learn to accept you,

With your extra flaws, scars, and fat,

Because that sack of bones known as a “model” on a Cosmopolitan cover will not keep him warm.

 

It is inscribed in the atoms that make you a person,

You are a three dimensional beautiful masterpiece,

You are not a computerized pixelated image

reshaped and resized, retouched and revised,

Stop letting society dehumanize a woman,

You are a woman.

 

Allow the fury to slither through your limbs until you shake with anger and purpose,

Acknowledge the value of your worth for you are more than just a waste of space,

You are space.

 

Comments

Additional Resources

Get AI Feedback on your poem

Interested in feedback on your poem? Try our AI Feedback tool.
 

 

If You Need Support

If you ever need help or support, we trust CrisisTextline.org for people dealing with depression. Text HOME to 741741