i am not unbeautiful

recently I have found myself
running my hands along the
new smoothness that has begun
to take over my body
and the new curves
that appear daily.

it is like discovering uncharted
land
and yet it is
in words and thoughts
that i have found myself
recently

and i've thought about you
the space between us
and how i feel closer to you
than i did the last time
that you held me close

it becomes more inevitable
everyday
that i will see you again soon
and i go from fear to excitement
and back again
every hour
because i am not the same
woman that you left

i know so much more
about myself
and my place
and my feet fit
naturally in the earth
and the concrete
and my curves settle
against amazing people
who inspire me
and hold me close to them
because i am
beautiful to them as well

and I have become more
beautiful
to your standards
with each calorie burned
and each cookie
abstained
and each hour at the gym
every morning

but it is the beauty
that i feel inside me
beyond the new curves
that my hands can travel
it is the new ideas
that roll in my mind
and the anger that burns my
tongue so that my
mouth stays
open
constantly
flapping to keep some cool
it is this beauty that i hope
you see

so when my friends tell me
how much you
will regret our past
when we meet again
i hope that it will be
for how much more of me
there is to know
and not
for how much less of me
there is to hold