"marble"

It took me a long time to fall in love with myself. It took candlelight, my first Samhain, a boy's biglittle love... Sometimes I am still enchanted by own face, still and wise as deer, and sometimes I am repulsed and I think Who is that misproportioned child? Where are the lines on my face, the scars, where is dancing swan and fierce-souled badger? Who is that child in the mirror? I suppose this is a mix of those reactions...
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only pretty when
sitting still
bombs ticking heart unflinching
mouth still as a rose, all somber pale
skin flush and eyes sinking,
hair dark and washed gold with wanting—
the reflection lit by candles,
a single bare bulb
the moon resting her hand on my face
fingers on the pearls of my breasts—
what I need to show you. That stare.
Gravity releasing taut skin, chin
to cheek over bird-bone shoulders
heart shuttered open, intensity angelified
winged gaze—unfluttering.
my face an open stretch of plain,
sky to be sewn shut, made only of
feathers to painted with touch—
too beautiful, you say. the way I
want to be seen, hard as crags
that fall only at the whim of the sea.
to be felt fully, held as the soft weight
of carved stone.

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Afterthoughts: the frequent mentioning of stone and statue/art metaphors is partially unintentioned--I love the way everyone thing looks when it's still, like a painting. I suppose that's what I was trying to get at--the drama and soulness I feel when I look in the mirror--all alone, all glowing, all myself.


What did you think?