Look at yourself
Not through your own contaminated lens
But through another’s
Through a loved one’s, through a stranger’s even
But not through your own
Because your eyes have become much too hazy
Distorted by a thick layer of self-hatred that’s been accumulating over all these years that you’ve been viewing yourself through a broken mirror
One that you shattered yourself
By hurling your sticks and your stones
and your sharpened words
Cutting your precious skin with daggers of self-depreciation
Shrinking yourself to fit into the black mirror
on the blank screen of your phone
My darling
You are so much more than the cramped four walls
of your disease-ridden brain
Don’t you know by now
That your orbit spans miles wide and mountains high
So much further than your boney fingertips could ever begin to reach
For too long you’ve hunted your own body in
a homemade arena
You’ve written yourself into your own tragedies for as long as you could hold a pen
And used a self-portrait as target practice for as long as you could hold a gun
But why? And for what?
Why do you believe whole-heartedly in the opinions of a stranger only when their words shoot to kill you
But paint them as a liar when they aim to heal you?
Why do you work tirelessly to please others
But decide the line must be drawn at your own two feet?
Why do you trust in empty, hate-filled designations
But deny them when they tell you all the things you ought to love about yourself? That damnit, you ought to love yourself!
Because you
Yes, you
Are only one you have
From the barren start to the bitter end
So make your home a comfortable one
Treat your soul as a loveable one
I think that maybe you’ll find
it will make your life a more bearable one