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Body Hair. Is. Beautiful. But Society Doesn't Think So...
Pressing into the pinky-red cushions
Legs crossed to squelch the breeze
Wood conforming to society’s demands
Warm and clammy under my knees
Black spikes unveiling in the sun
Unpleasant like cucumber spines
Beneath my shielding fingers
I break unwritten guidelines
Catching glances from older women
They despise
How I shred and stomp upon
The social standards they idolize
You pull me down
Pushing me back into a rigid box where I lack the power to escape
Stripped of my humanity, my dignity
I’m just a people pleaser with a “proper” landscape
Oh...
How will a man ever look into my eyes?
Or caress my thighs?
How will he make me his bride?
Or hold me responsible for his child?
If I have prickly thighs
Boroughing into my head
A dizzying blur - the world spins
My head pounding until
I give in
Scraping my bubblegum pink razor up and down
Three small blades whisper
Over my expansive plains of pasty skin
Its dullness leaves behind a patch of whiskers
Rinsing off my balded legs
I pat them dry
The lingering white tea moisturizer does nothing to aid the burning
I was a fool to buy it
Your rosy hue of red and white
Mocks me on the shelf
Duller razors for higher prices
I tell myself it’s just a color
Yet your vibrancy coaxes me
To pay every extra dollar
Lathering handfuls of vanilla-coconut lotion onto my legs
Soothing the fiery ants that have come to play
The scent gives me a headache
And the itch still doesn’t go away
You would think that my bullying brain would be satisfied with my smooth legs
But guilt consumes me for succumbing to society’s expectations
For perpetuating men’s control over women’s bodies
Their greediness and abusive relations
Numb
Bumpy and smooth at the same time
Struggling to love myself in every state
So I pace in circles of endless rhymes
“Everything’s fine,” I tell myself
But it’s not
Body hair is perfectly fine on a man
But gross and unacceptable on a woman
Because women are forced to please others
To act like a dispensable object instead of a person
Barbies are our standards for beauty
Smooth plastic without a wrinkle or hair
It is my duty to stand up against this one-dimensional beauty
To make people more aware of unfairness
Body hair. Is. Beautiful.
Body hair removal should be a choice, not a misogynistic confinement.
Know your worth.
Don’t settle. Don’t conform.
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