Body of Beauty

To the girl with strawberry earrings, cupcake eyelids and a confetti lined body.

You are beautiful,
but not in the way your first lover told you.
Not in the way of demanding action.

To the girl with strawberry earrings, you are so beautiful.
More so than skin deep. More so than in your jeans deep.
Worth more than a pile of meat, you are beautiful
So much more than your "thank you" could ever respond to compliments with.

Beautiful girl, at age twelve you will realize your chest was too small and your stomach too large.
Beautiful girl, he called you. His beautiful girl.
When he left you questioned everything.
A living mystery in young adolescence.

Beautiful girl, with a song in her heart and a story in her eyes.

Wake up.

The strawberry meadows of your mind too quickly became jam; jammed with the other voices.

Entering high school like the gates of Hell.
Burning your body with embers of days your criminals long forgot about.
Beautiful girl, whose apple red cheeks were stained with tears.
Beautiful girl, who forgot how to eat out of fear.
Beautiful girl, who did her makeup charismatically.
Who wore her smile like a pendent upon her chest.

Beautiful girl, you knew better than to open the dam of your mind, for you knew oceans could flood out.
That damn mind of yours, strangling you in the size of your waist in a dressing room.
Suffocating your chest, no, stuffing your chest to create empty and lumpy illusions.
Making you feel as though you always had something to prove.

Beautiful girl, stop, beautiful girl
Not every room is a battlefield.
Not every mirror a warfront.
The grenade of your mind is pinned to your lips, all you have to do is not pull it.

Beautiful girl, you are a fresh April dew.
You are the alluring scent of rose petals.
You are a star-lit night and a beaming sun rise.
To the girl with strawberry earrings, there is no one chasing you anymore.

You are free

You are as free as the birds up above.
You are untamed and wind blown like the formless shifting cotton of the Heavens.

You are unarmed.

No more pistol to your tongue for the imaginary friends of standard.

Beautiful girl, you are beauty.
To the girl with strawberry earrings, to the girl reading this, you are a beautiful girl.