An ode to my “metro-sexual” love(er)

I stare at you, your white cheeks with purple blotches,
Of unborn pimples waiting to blossom out,
Rupturing your smooth, clean shaven skin…

Like my juvenile love, nursed with care,
Fed with fantasy and guarded assiduously

From you, from the world, from all things real,
That will shatter my quivering hopes

I sit next to you, inhaling your car smells,
Letting the new hard back leather fumes mix with your intoxicating body spray fill my lungs…
I hold back the coughing, fearful of squeezing out “your signature fragrance” from my alveoli

You are so close, with your meticulously manicured fingers gently brushing my knee,
Every time you change gears,
I want to reach out,
I want to run my fingers (with their hangnails and smitten skin)
Behind your moisturised neck

I want to put my chapped lips, on your glossy ones,
But I’m afraid… of sucking out your cooling balm.

Instead, I watch you with the corners of my eyes,
Awed by the new up-side-down chrome spectacle frames,
With little bat-wings on either side

The moosed hair strands stand upright,
Mocking my loose curls that have run amuck

I shut my eyelids tight,
Trying to erase the images of the perfect chics with divine dimensions,
Burgundy hair and “Brazilians” (waxing choice)

That moulds your perception of a perfect woman,
Every time they pop up in your sleek handset’s screensaver

My cherished mint-choco-chip ice-cream scoops
Threaten to come out of my tummy
As you detail your new diet plans
And the new fat burning regime
To tone those 6-pack choco slabs
And inflate the already bulging biceps

I don’t know what drove you to this “wellness” frenzy
With alovera masks and cucumber peels adorning your face
In a maddening bid to erase those purple blotches…
Is it those perfect chics who told you that they needed a perfect man?
Is that what you want - Perfect flesh on flesh?

If only you could see beyond
My spare tyres
Hairy legs
And un-plucked eyebrows

If only you could take off your
Conformist glasses
And quit trying to fit me into your
“typical girly” mould

Beneath these human imperfections,
Covered by a skin with a few black heads, white heads and pimply scars (yet totally kissable)
Lies a heart that will accept you, with the natural bulges of the old age
A receding hair line and puffy eyes that night cream does not erase

I shall watch and wait
Till you hopefully come to your senses
And realise that you are but a victim of the “beauty industry”
An “early adopter” in their yet fully untapped male market
And realise that true love is not put off by imperfections of the flesh

But lingers on by learning to love and cherish those very same “incongruities”
Over a large serving of mint-choco-chip ice cream topped with roasted cashew and chocolate source….