Everything has beauty but not everyone sees it. — Confucious
Beauty and the Beast
by Renee Y. Brown
I put pen to paper and with words intend
Writing a letter, but not to send.
What I write will remain unknown
To the man I love it will never be shown.
In words unspoken and silent dreams
I show him all that can’t be seen.
My heart open, my face unmasked,
So who I am is clear as glass.
My hero sees beyond his eyes
And finds in truth where beauty lies.
He loves me in the world of my mind
Outside of that, the prince is not mine.
Fairy tales are just as life
The beautiful face becomes the wife.
So I shake my head, I sigh, I know
Like fairy tales life too does go.
I set pen to paper and write words without end
A lifetime of letters never to send.
I live in this world and so does he
And only with eyes do people see.
My love for him is manifest
In not asking him to rest
The sight of his lovely eyes on me —
Beauty’s love for this beast cannot be.
~~~
It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness. –- Leo Tolstoy
Mirror, Mirror
by Renee Y. Brown
Mirror, mirror on the wall
Who’s the fairest one of all?
Most fair of face, of flesh and hair
A single beauty beyond compare?
In fairy tales what’s fair is right,
Beauty is virtue
Love
Justice
Light
Worthiness by fairness of face
Deserving of the saving grace
In a prince’s kiss, the gift of life
Eternal love as princess wife.
Her only virtue in being seen
As the fairest of all to reign as queen.
To say ugly is evil, beauty is good
Makes fairy tales hate-speech for childhood.
They teach little girls to hate what they see
When they look in a mirror and know they can’t be
The beautiful princess who gets it all
Because she’s the fairest of them all.
The mirror haunts girls all their lives
From their very first glance till the day they die.
‘How do I look, is it good enough?’
But it never is, you can’t measure up.
Appearance is value and so they are judged
By the world, by culture, and mostly themselves.
All true values that come from within
Are superseded by the value of skin.
Courage, compassion, integrity
Intelligence, talent, ability
And most of all, genius –
In women superfluous
Denied, denounced, denigrated, destroyed
Ignored, bullied, ridiculed, and void.
Genius is a beauty that comes from the mind
And creates beauty that can’t be defined
By facial structure and tight skin
Or youthful bodies smooth and thin.
But the collective fairy tale implies
Female genius as ugly, evil, ostracized
Usually ending in homicide.
Cinderella, Snow White, or Princess Pretty Generic,
Disney’s ugly villains, beautiful good girls and handsome princes heroic
Brainwash generations of girls from one century to another
To hate themselves and judge each other
To love the handsome charming abuser
And dismiss the invisible nice guy as loser.
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Who’s the fairest one of all?
Fair as fair as in equality
Justice, freedom, empathy,
A world without war and poverty.
What’s fair is fair for all humanity.
The one who’s fairest of all
Is the one who’s fairest towards us all —
The one who smashes the mirror and makes it fall.
~~~
It’s not what you look at that matters…it’s what you see.— Henry David Thoreau
A Kiss From The Prince
by Renee Y. Brown
Sleeping
But not a beauty
I sleepwalked through life
Waiting for the magic kiss
Of the prince to awaken me
And bring my happily-ever-after.
Not that I expected much –
After a lifetime of waiting, getting older and ever more ‘not a beauty’
I slumped into
Self-hatred
Victimhood
Anger
Jealousy
Depression
Ingratitude
Unforgiving of
All the sins
Humanity
And God
Had done unto me.
Then one night
My prince finally arrived.
He placed a gentle kiss
Upon my sleeping lips
And I awoke.
I thought I was still dreaming but there he stood,
Just as I had imagined –
Handsome, regal,
And radiating love for me.
“At last,” I said, “I’ve been waiting so long.”
“Then you’re an idiot,” he said.
“Wait, my prince would never say that.”
“But you do.”
“I thought you were here to rescue me.”
“I am if you’d just shut up and open up.”
“Maybe I should call 911.”
“I am your 911.”
“You love me… don’t you?”
“Blessed are those who love themselves for they shall always be loved.”
“Huh?”
“You heard me. Blessed are those who choose happiness for they feel the mind of God.”
“That sounds like New Age bullshit. What kind of prince are you?”
“Yours. Blessed are the receivers for they shall receive.”
“I thought the poor were blessed?”
“Do you think poverty is a blessing? Blessed are those who count their blessings for their blessings shall be multiplied.”
“Get out.”
“Blessed are the grateful for they hold the keys to the kingdom.”
“Stop being cruel!”
“Blessed are those who reject victimhood for theirs is the power to live.”
“I hate you!”
“Blessed are the forgivers for they create universes.”
There was nothing left for me to say. My prince smiled.
“No more whining. Get up and go forth.
You are never alone because we are all one and you can’t destroy yourself enough to ever be separated.
Whiners only get more to whine about.
Accept this gift, say thanks, love me by loving yourself and remember the prince never comes to you and you never go to him.
You are the prince and the princess and the alpha and the omega.
I am with you always because you are the always and time, which doesn’t exist, is now.
BTW, you are beautiful and I love you. Kiss-kiss.”
He disappeared but he wasn’t gone.
I got up and looked in the mirror and I saw All That Is.
I never looked better.
Kiss-kiss.
~~~
Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder. — Kinky Friedman
Renee Y. Brown is an American army veteran who now has all the time in the world to devote to writing, general goofing around and catching up on sleep. Born and raised in Los Angeles, she is making her wayward way back home one state at a time, eventually. Never offer her a free meal because she will take you up on it. Her Linked-In page is: https://www.linkedin.com/pub/renee-y-brown/6/682/86b
LL Ballack