I am a rotten mango

I've been seeing a lot of girls on Pinterest

With bodies that don't look like mine

And I don't look away, because they are beautiful--they are pictures I look for and want to see

But I have doubts, that any of those girls would really want my eyes on them

There is a lot of longing, here, lodged beside whatever arteries pump the strongest in my heart

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I want to lay beside most of these women in a dirty, sun-bleached bungalow--

But when I pull the t-shirt off of my back, I want to see my interest reflected back at me, just as potent

And I guess I've been called beautiful plenty of times, and eighteen is not the age you are supposed to feel at home behind the chest your parents gave you, but a rancid mango, green and yellow and wet-looking, dripping amongst a crop of dried wheat, is almost always going to taste sweet

And I guess Venus didn't rise from the foam with my body carved from lighter shades comparing herself to Hera, but Ancient Greece was 2,500 years ago, and the warships sailed in awe of my hips are long gone

Then again, rotting fruit is good compost material, and an empty stretch of sea means more marine life to fill it

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So maybe I have something to offer, even if it is not a physical kind of match

Because wanting a beautiful thing often makes me question the validity of my own desire

And yet desire is almost always chance, your body caught without you knowing

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Maybe there's a pretty girl somewhere who will pick the rot away

Wipe her sticky fingers off

And plant the seed