2024 Finalists

I was told
Face is the most important
And most noticible
It is the attraction
It is your identity
It is your soul

But they looked at me and said
What a ghastly view
I thought
It is not attraction
And the head is not important
It would be better
If it was detached
So it would not bother anymore

I was told
The body is a temple
Sacred, precious and demure
But the touch I felt on my breasts
From a stranger on the streets
Was not so pure
Then I erased the body
So there wouldn’t be
No lure

I stand in my room
In front of my mirror
Naked and alone
With a flash light on
Looking for a new thing
To pick on
Yet wishing
If only the illuminating light
Would blind my anxiousness away

But it never goes away
It clings as if it had claws
Leaving me wanting
To rip my skin off
And be left as nothing

So at 3am I say
Bloody bloody Mary
But I stand there as nothing happens
Hoping to see a red reaper
Yet there is no one in the mirror

Instead I see myself
Vulnerable and upset
And the only red I see
Is leaking through my tights
Reminding me
The word female
Is going to haunt me everytime

(28/33)