If I Could Change

If I could change one thing

I would change the locks on my sister's eyes

so that she wouldn't see the air-brushed women on the cover of magazienes.

I would bar her ears from the kids at school

who called her a boy, again. 

And give every child the x-ray glasses derived from cerial boxes

To see the young woman

That wears a hardened shell

With hairline fractures beneath fifty shades of insecurity.

I would place my sister in a room of mirrors

so that her freckled grin and my mother's eyes

could stare back, etching unspoken votes of confidence into her mind.

If I could change one thing

I would change look on the face of the girl in my English class

Sporting something akin to a sunken grimmace.

The girl that now tags her Instagram photos "#thinspiration"

I would take her back to the day her friends first commented on the seismic activity of her thighs

Convince her that friendship is not determined by kilograms or pounds

I would have handed her a list

Of every girl that envied her

And every boy that gawked at her in passing.

So maybe then our teacher wouldn't have announced

That Adeline would not be in class for the rest of the semester.

If I could change one thing

I would change the meaning of beauty.

I would replace every snide remark with a random act of kindness

I would replace tears with laugher

And scars with love bites.

If I could change one thing,

I would.