What is Pride?

Pride is –
Spending too much money on a shiny dress,
Meant to impress, immediately,
Because revealing the inner workings of one’s mind,
Is unpopular and takes too much time.

Pride is –
Knowing that you love someone fiercely
But waiting for them to say it first,
Because if worst comes to worst,
You can lie and deny and hide it away inside.

Pride is –
Tucking all your favorite parts of self
Deep within, out of a stranger’s view,
So you can carefully select qualities and hobbies,
For them to admire in the someone you pretend is you.

Pride is –
Gauging everyone on the rigged scale
You haphazardly balance upon;
Picking and choosing to strategically measure
Certain traits their own pride has let you in on.

Pride is –
What keeps me writing ‘you’
As if I were not guilty, too.

– Jessie Gutierrez