What are you doing here?
Words reserved for my mother
I say now to the mirror.
Looking glass: fairness unchallenged,
except by this earth and fire,
I buried deep, my two burning
stones of wood, observing the dying
embers inherited in my blood. Me,
clothed in my mother’s body, sheep
inside wolf, pacing, always
the same story: these curves never left,
like bronze belts, hoisted around hips, thighs,
bellies—I am myself, I am a wicked
stranger, I am a familiar guest with
no host. She can see
through the mirror, even when I look
away, even when I veil
with smoke and powder, these stones
melt. She knows me, I menace
to flower petals, plucking—she knows me not.
Even as a girl, she was more child than me,
me more mother than daughter, holes in me
which can’t be filled, even with seeds, rocks, this
earth—my soul will always be indented, a debt
which I lower myself into, a pit of her
and I: porous. Poor us. I have known
no allegiance except to a mirror,
life as a captive, a standoff
between stone and wood, fighting off
fire, her grip, my fingers on the porcelain sink.
What are you doing here,
she will say when I meet her
for the last time.