Goddess

Or the relative beauty

Peter Paul Rubens’ Venus at a Mirror

Splendid

A soul with room for growth peers out from beneath puffy brown eyes looking at the goddess I want to be but only seeing the woman I am.

In the mirror there are the telltale signs of my mouse brown roots that have seldom been the same colour or style from one season to the next.

Despite the change in my hair this always remains constant.

I like the soft round of my belly and the gentle curve of my hips. I especially love the tender fullness of my breast even if they are no longer twenty-two.

Now I’m smiling for in that moment I’m beautiful. Hands on face, lips parted, eyes sparkling with glee and face flushed with some private satisfaction.

My body is alive with immeasurable joy and I'm suddenly glad to be a woman.

Then misery intercedes with cold feet on wet tiles for while I laughed the tube ran over. I don’t mind for now I’m made to frown for I’ve see the hairs on my leg.

I’m a beast, covered in hair I must tend – shave, wax, comb or tame – I’m forever grooming.

I laugh out loud at my quest and the absurd nature of the body beautiful, my body beautiful.

While I contemplate the imperfection misery vanishes and is replaced with an overwhelming feeling of vulnerability.

It takes a full hour of tending with moisturizers and toners enriched with vitamins minerals and supplements all with the promise to improve.

Make beautiful.

I’m a woman of sound[ish] mind and body so I have the application process down to a science exfoliating, rubbing on and then off.

Then and only then do I sigh with something like relief but while I dress to face the world I feel it.

Naked.

 Girl at Mirror Norman Rockwell

My love, my care,

Simone