What is Beauty? & Unrequited

These are two poems I recently wrote and need some help with editing. Please give me your thoughts.

What Is Beauty?

(I'm debating cutting this first stanza)
No one ever told me
That I was beautiful
Not in a way that
I’d believe it
See, it’s hard to believe
Words spoken out of empty obligation
Or misplaced jealousy
Because for every boy that said it,
I heard an alternate motive
And anytime a girl told me
“you’re so pretty” because I had
Some trait that was “better”
Than theirs, I was sitting
Wishing I had their eyes,
Skins, lips, body, laugh
Because no one ever told me
That I was beautiful

How do we define beauty?
Is it in the plastic smiles
Plastered on the plastic faces
Of the plastic people?
Is it the obsessively toned,
Tan bodies of the self-obsessed?
Or the painted skin on the
Painted faces of the girls
Too scared to move should
Their painted masterpiece
Sweat off and show
What’s underneath

Is beauty what’s shown to us
By the media, by those who came before us
Is beauty confined by
Societal restrictions?

See my definition of flawless
Is a girl who flaunts her blemishes
Her every imperfection
And dares the world
To take her as she is

And my idea of sexy
Is walking into a room
And caring more about
The people in it
Than what they’re thinking of you

And beauty is acceptance
It’s looking in the mirror
And saying “I am beautiful.
This zit. Beautiful.
These teeth, they’re beautiful.
This nose, beautiful
These eyes, beautiful.
This crazy, unruly hair. Beautiful.”
All of these things are beautiful
Because they make me, me.

I’m here to tell you something
Something that I believe
From the bottom of my soul:
You are beautiful.

And it doesn’t matter
What you see slapped on
The magazines or projected
On the tv
Because that’s not beauty,
That’s business



Unrequited

this poem is for anyone
who has ever loved someone
for those of us who
understand the fuss
of unrequited love
we get it,
we've been there

we brought you soup
when you were sick
we were there when
you needed a ride
we held your hand
through the 32 stitches
above your left eyebrow

we were you sympathy date
to that dinner event
and pretended to unwillingly consent
while all the while
we were thinking about how
great we could be

this is for the people
who know what it's like
to be perpetually in the
"friend zone"

we're the ones
who would move
Heaven and earth
for an hour of your time

we went on long walks
had deep talks
ad waited for
opportunity to knock

this is for anyone
who's listened to you
talk about the other
person for hours
because we love
the sound of your voice

we jumped at the chance
to be with you
and silently wished
you'd see through
our unsteady facade

this is for the people
who've sat by and watched
as you were with
the wrong one, wrong one, wrong one
all the while knowing
we're the right one

we were there for you whenever
you needed us and prayed someday
you'd realize we were forever

this poem is for anyone
who's stayed up all night
thinking about
what it could be like
what it would be like
what it should be like

For the unrequited lovers
because there's something
beautiful in the way
the ocean refuses
to stop kissing the shore
no matter how many
times it's turned away

for those of us
who loved the people
who never knew or
understood what we
would do for them

this poem is for anyone
who has ever loved someone