Can I Be Pretty Now?

its her 3rd birthday

flowing dress, pink ribbons

curly hair in mother’s clip

watching the big girls walk the streets

turns to her friend who she’s just meet

toothless smile from ear to ear

Can I be pretty now?

its her 10th birthday

hair in bobby pins and ponytails

to tame the curls she used to love

with chubby thighs and heavy arms

she see her friends all pencil thin

she looks to her friend she know for years

with a smile full of crooked teeth and metal wire  

Can I be pretty now?

its her 15th birthday

red lipstick and mascara running down her face

straighten hair, her favorite shirt

just experienced her first heartbreak

she watches couples walk the streets

dreaming to be like them, like she used to be

crying to her friend the only one left

a broken smile she’s just able to create

Can I be pretty now?

its her 17th birthday

messy hair, chapped lips

crying eyes, and cut up wrists

bony thighs, skeletal arms

looking at the girls in the magazine

pleading to the mirror

with a smile she can only barely fake.

Can I be pretty now?

it would be her 18th birthday

But instead she sits up in the clouds

Looking down at all the girls and all the heartache

She see the hurt she sees the pain

The cuts and the bruises

The brokendown hearts and fake smiles

As young girls cry and plead to their mirrors

Can I be pretty now?