My cousin is a little girl
With a crooked brow, jagged teeth,
And a strong dent in her chin.
It was an ugly mold in her brown skin,
But it was beautiful.
Beautiful are our imperfections,
For beauty has always been something rare,
A thing that stands out in a sea of things unfair.
Lighthouse keepers.
They decide who meets the panning glare.
“They” becomes we,
Unconsciously, society,
That soon casts the beam,
Shining the light down below again for “we.”
And from youth we grow to only know
The non-existence of variety.
Her dent reminded me,
That out of all the things we try and be,
We will always be guided things, striving for supremacy,
Who have lost the simplicity
Of living just to be.
Rather than fighting reflexively to prove ourselves superior.
To those our eyes deem different.
Different is every hideous smile,
The infection that turns the skin into velvety creases and folds—
All the natural curves we try to chip off our statues.
Statues, monuments, objects.
Abodes of a mind often forgotten.
To be created and take up space,
Is to be a lump of clay,
Soon chiseled by an arbitrary wind,
That has the power to rip through every ceramic.
Yet we are all shaped from the same earth.
Until our difference is made dramatic.
