My Mistress’ beauty is nothing like her recent IG post

1. My Mistress’ beauty is nothing like her recent IG post
2. Filter is far more smooth than her skin’s texture
3. If angles on instagram make her beauty engrossed
4. Why does the reality of her body lose its structure 
5. Through a screen her posts upholds a perfect disguise 
6. In a pixelated world her gleaming eyes are the prize
7. No airbrush editing can improvise 
8. The authenticity where her candid self hides
9. She sees my love in the number of her likes
10. But her laughter is where I find happiness behold
11. When her legitimate smile strikes
12. It’s worth more than a social media facade can uphold 
13. Beyond the social screen her true beauty lies within
14. Her genuine splendor makes my heart spin 

For my piece, “My mistress’ beauty is nothing like her recent IG post,” I was inspired to imitate Shakespeare’s sonnet, “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun.” So, when thinking of how to make Shakespeare’s sonnet fit our modern age, I immediately thought of social media and different ways to integrate the topic into a sonnet form.  The speaker in Shakespeare’s piece compares his mistress to different world beauties, like the sun. However, the speaker also compares different body parts of his mistress, like her hair and lips. The speaker’s comparison made me think of how frequently people are critical of how they present themselves on social media and even go as far as to compare themselves to different people on multiple platforms. 

So, for my piece, I wanted to have the same aspects of the speaker in Shakespeare’s sonnet, where he compares his lover to different things. Still, for my piece, I wanted my speaker to compare their lover to their Instagram posts and how the speaker doesn’t believe his lover looks like that in person. So I began with a similar opening to Shakespeare, saying, “My Mistress’s beauty is nothing like her recent IG post.”  Yet, I had to keep in mind that the rhyming scheme is every other line, so finding words that rhyme but also flow was a little tricky. I included different aspects people think of when they think of social media. For instance, I continued by saying, “Filter is far smoother than her skin’s texture; if angles on Instagram make her beauty engrossed, Why does the reality of her body lose its structure.” In this, I’m comparing the lover’s skin to the filter she uses, which blurs out her textured skin. People can use angles to get a desired look, but the speaker realizes that their lover’s body does not look like that in real life. 

I tried to include the lover’s body because the Shakespearean sonnet is a lot about physical love, a somewhat sensual love. There is also a slant rhyme within lines two and four. My volta appears in line nine, where the speaker shifts from talking about the facade their lover keeps up on social screens to how the speaker finds happiness with his lover in simple moments, like where the lover portrays pure happiness. My couplet, “Beyond the social screen her true beauty lies within; Her genuine splendor makes my heart spin,” is meant to answer why the speaker’s lover’s beauty on Instagram doesn’t grasp their attention. The answer is that the lover does not present their genuine self on social media, and the speaker is in love with their lover’s genuine self rather than a facade they hold on social media.

Janayah Applon