Such excellent imagery. Thank you. And may I say. I am 73 years old and have had the great treasure you describe in my life. Can one speak humbly of being adored by the adored? Yet in the end— and I approach it now— it wasn’t about my looks (maybe average) but how I was reflected in the eyes of the adored one. I wrote this:
When yearning and longing meet. Once the ethereal desires of youth. Now the longings looking back at those desires. Looking for that final leaning against its true meaning. The strength and beauty of solid flesh, now residing only in mixture of feelings and memories. Always the longing for connection.
Tomorrow I celebrate my 68th birthday. I haven't been looked at for my beauty, or held a lingering, lustful gaze, in a very long time. I study a photograph from 1979, a glorious photograph of myself at 22, and I wonder why I doubted my beauty back then, why I did not trust it, had no concept of it although I was highly aware of it in other women, why I was so hard on myself, why the camera could capture me but I had...absolutely...no idea...it is quite sad. I remember the men who understood me, who truly saw me and could not resist me all those decades ago. There is something to be said for the fleeting. I am at peace with it, because the memories bring me comfort, and I know that I lived, and that for a short time, I was beautiful. Thank you very much for your essay - I hope you can see how deeply it moved me.
Beauty – real, aching, world-tilting beauty – isn’t something you wait for. It isn’t granted, bestowed, or measured in symmetry and bone structure. It’s something you decide. You claim it, drape it over your shoulders like a silk robe, hold it in your teeth like a secret you’ll never give away.
You already are art. You already are Helen in her tower, Venus rising, the Vermeer girl with her lips parted on the edge of something electric. The trick – the great illusion – isn’t becoming beautiful, but realising you always were.
And if beauty is, as someone once said, in the eye of the beholder, then behold yourself.
The girl I'm talking to is all these... It is as if you are describing her. In a way she has been my undoing, but also my redemption. She forced me to confront the kind of man I imagine myself to be, and aim for that.
If you truly BELIEVE ( very important) you've been made in God's image and serving him and others then you ALREADY are beautiful... Thats a no brainer... 🙌
Sherry, you are genius with words, a magician. This has to be my favorite essay. You have captured exactly what and how I’ve been feeling for a long time. Thank you. I want to paint these words and sprawl this piece on every gallery wall and mural in the city.
I read this three times already and it's one of the best I've come across since I joined substack.
Appreciate it 💘
Such excellent imagery. Thank you. And may I say. I am 73 years old and have had the great treasure you describe in my life. Can one speak humbly of being adored by the adored? Yet in the end— and I approach it now— it wasn’t about my looks (maybe average) but how I was reflected in the eyes of the adored one. I wrote this:
Hook
It is not flesh nor beauty
Nor strength nor flashes
Of any sort
And now it is not, can not
Be hope or possibilities or potentials
For their time has passed
It is not flesh nor beauty
Nor strength nor
Thunder
And, that it is not now,
And, that it has endured
It never was those things
And only now can that
Unmistakably be seen
It is a hook in a heart
And a hook in a heart
And ligatures between them
Whose pain is only relieved
When one rests
Against the other
—Latayne C Scott
When yearning and longing meet. Once the ethereal desires of youth. Now the longings looking back at those desires. Looking for that final leaning against its true meaning. The strength and beauty of solid flesh, now residing only in mixture of feelings and memories. Always the longing for connection.
Tomorrow I celebrate my 68th birthday. I haven't been looked at for my beauty, or held a lingering, lustful gaze, in a very long time. I study a photograph from 1979, a glorious photograph of myself at 22, and I wonder why I doubted my beauty back then, why I did not trust it, had no concept of it although I was highly aware of it in other women, why I was so hard on myself, why the camera could capture me but I had...absolutely...no idea...it is quite sad. I remember the men who understood me, who truly saw me and could not resist me all those decades ago. There is something to be said for the fleeting. I am at peace with it, because the memories bring me comfort, and I know that I lived, and that for a short time, I was beautiful. Thank you very much for your essay - I hope you can see how deeply it moved me.
Happy birthday! :) I wish you peace and freedom to be who you are
Beautifully written!
Wow, this is so gorgeously poetic and moving.
❤️❤️
Beauty – real, aching, world-tilting beauty – isn’t something you wait for. It isn’t granted, bestowed, or measured in symmetry and bone structure. It’s something you decide. You claim it, drape it over your shoulders like a silk robe, hold it in your teeth like a secret you’ll never give away.
You already are art. You already are Helen in her tower, Venus rising, the Vermeer girl with her lips parted on the edge of something electric. The trick – the great illusion – isn’t becoming beautiful, but realising you always were.
And if beauty is, as someone once said, in the eye of the beholder, then behold yourself.
"The trick – the great illusion – isn’t becoming beautiful, but realising you always were." ❤️
Your writing is so beautiful it terrifies me a little bit.
😭❤️
Absolutely loved this
This is absolutely stunning and amazing! I love this!
This left me speechless. Wow.
Me too. 😢 I wish I was, so so badly. Alas, most likely not this lifetime.
The girl I'm talking to is all these... It is as if you are describing her. In a way she has been my undoing, but also my redemption. She forced me to confront the kind of man I imagine myself to be, and aim for that.
If you truly BELIEVE ( very important) you've been made in God's image and serving him and others then you ALREADY are beautiful... Thats a no brainer... 🙌
I really really do feel and enjoy your writing and a deep sense of you communicated. I can lean on this!
Here’s looking at me kid. 😊
Sherry, you are genius with words, a magician. This has to be my favorite essay. You have captured exactly what and how I’ve been feeling for a long time. Thank you. I want to paint these words and sprawl this piece on every gallery wall and mural in the city.
I will think about this for YEARS ❤️ thank you so, so, so much. I'm glad you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.