Self Doubt

Is my brilliance all in my ego-inflated head?

 

Laying on my back in the mirror
My breasts flat -
chubby back -
Double chin.

You're beautiful, she says.
And I look back at the mirror
Questioning its statement
Made first.
Did the mirror lie?
Will it come back to beauty
As soon as I process her words:
You're beautiful?
Self doubt.

Ten-year-old handwriting
Sloppily trying to be pretty.
Preaching God.
God
Like my mother taught.
God
Like my grandfather warned.
God
Like the old woman whispered.

God and angels I wrote about.
The only ones that were really listening
The only ones that really heard.
The only ones that mattered.

Even at ten years old
I thought about it.
I knew the deepest doctrines
The hidden "truths"
That Mormons put under rocks
So they aren't shut down.
I listened so closely
And I wrote.
I wrote three poems a day.
The mysteries.
I thought so much about God.
God and the universe.
God and eternity.
God and Jesus
And satan.
And then it began somewhere in the shadows inside me.
Self doubt.

Leaving the church
My inspiration faded.
I wrote about leaving.
I wrote about sex and my self discovery -
My w***e-self.
I wrote about the nature of good and evil:
All things were gray
In actuality.

Then I wrote about colors.
Green evolution and goddesses,
Breasts and bellies creating the landscape.

Now when I write
My poems are simple.
The obvious thoughts we all have.
The once-poignant discoveries
Now dull and exhausted.
Was I a prodigy
Or was I just too young to know
That I was no Picasso?
Self doubt.

Reviews

[Kelly B]

Love it. Don't hate yourself though, I've been there.