What is beauty?

It’s sure not me

When I look in the mirror, all I see

Is a reflection of imperfections and problems that need to be fixed

I can’t really remember the last time or even a time

When my skin was perfect

All I remember are the same questions and remarks people made:

“Oh my god, what happened to your face?”

“Do you wash your face enough?”

“Don’t touch your face so much, you’ll make it worse!”

“Here’s a remedy I read about online, I’ll forward it to your mom”

These people that constantly made these remarks

They weren’t just random people I’d never see again

They were my relatives: my aunts, my uncles, my cousins, even my own mother

Everyday, I struggled to meet their definition of beauty,

To be beautiful in their eyes

I used lightening cream to be “whiter”

I used every homemade remedy out there to get rid of the one problem that stared back at me

And still nothing….

It only got worse to the point where it physically hurt to move my face

Acne was winning, and me, I was losing to a battle that I was fighting for way too long

This idea that beauty had power over me,

A power that I couldn’t escape

Until I finally got rid of all the weight on my shoulders,

The weight of expectations that weren’t ever mine,

I stand in front of you today,

Nowhere near perfect,

But better

I stand here today,

with scars from my battle against Beauty,

Scars,

That serve as a daily reminder

That what I see in the mirror,

Isn’t a reflection of imperfections and problems that need fixing,

But rather a reflection of all that I conquered and survived through.