solitary

(http://www.trendhunter.com/trends/mary-jane-ansell)

the girl knits a collection

of odds and ends –

 

various plastic containers,

glass jars for holding candlelight,

vintage books as coffee coasters –

 

this is how she values herself.

 

she scatters them like tiny diamonds

into the folds of her tiny home and

waits, broad-shouldered, for someone

to ask what she thinks of late at night.

 

where most would turn their heads

she curls tired branchy fingers around

a decades old mirror that fogs at the

edges; she sees nothing in its frame

and desperately she buys it anyway.

 

then there is this:

 

she is cooking for two

with eyed potatoes from

the three-tiered fruit basket

beside her kitchen window.

 

a single battered apple

is sliced into depressing

origami shapes on an

old cutting board.

 

a chilled pot of coffee complete

with floating sediment is placed

beside two ceramic mugs each

depicting the flag of New Mexico.

 

she sets the table with

her bones as cutlery and

folds her hands in prayer,

thanks no one for such a feast.

 

she unfolds a newspaper in

her lap – August 3rd, 1998 –

and looks across at herself,

every morsel already gone.

 

shapeshifting

(http://www.funofart.com/12-surreal-faces-to-inspire-you/)

I know a woman

who is existing in parallels,

yawning away the days

in a bone yard.

 

she shapeshifts

in the rain, she

swallows compliments

to thicken her lackluster skin.

 

I keep her under my tongue,

I keep her beneath the nails

on each broken index finger

and she is a trigger

I threaten to pull

with every aching silent wonder

that dresses me in starlight.

 

she comes up for air as often as a fish;

I am putting her to bed with dreams.

 

in secret I am heeding

her advice, because

our hands are the hands

that shift the universe.

 

and I’ve learned how

to sew to hide the damage,

maybe even to pretend

I don’t need any of this.

museum of me

(http://rebloggy.com/post/surrealism-anatomy-surreal-art-fernando-vicente/88480807114)

you caught me in our closet

again, plucking strands of hair

in the almost dark.

 

I said I was weaving curtains

to keep your mother out,

so you turned on the overhead

bulb and went back to bed.

 

at breakfast you said weren’t hungry

while I hovered around your knees,

sopping up the milk that bled like

canvas paint through the bowl I’d

made from the bits of me I’d been saving.

 

I baptized your spoon and examined

what I’d been leaving behind; five

of my molars formed the handle.

I tossed it in with the other cutlery

and when you left for work you kissed

me goodbye and my jaw fell off.

 

I think you were absentminded when

you put it in your briefcase with your

ballpoint pens and paperwork, and I

was left at home to cover all the mirrors.

 

I think I hid beneath the bed until

I heard our screen door open and slap shut.

 

when I emerged all limbs you’d popped

open your case on our bedroom floor,

making a museum of me.

 

and while I reached for every piece

with newspaper hands you sunk

into a nearby chair, clicked on the

lamp and read me every hidden archive.

** I would like to thank WordPress for choosing my poem, a poet to her son, to be Freshly Pressed last week, and to all those who liked, commented, or chose to follow my blog based on that piece: your feedback has been overwhelming. Thank you so, so much. I look forward to making even more writing connections!

the grower

(http://jeannie2278.pixnet.net/blog/post/11414616)

it was spring and

my mind had withered to

hydrangea petals

all blue

twig fingers

scaling corners

of all the things

they could not touch.

 

i tried to say all

of where i’d been but

the earth pulled

at my elbows

and knees like

silk kite strings i

struggled to unravel

from around glass ankles.

 

taking flight was

a greenhouse pipe dream

i’d hidden in the

brightest pot

before i

placed petals where

my eyes used to be

and one behind my ear.

 

let them come, i thought

the grieving

chrysanthemums

might make

them think

of me

struggling to grow myself

somewhere out there.

i see me best

(http://beritalits.wordpress.com/2010/07/)

take a look at my body,

can you see it?

 

I am a slow-dying series of rainstorms

drowning in the possibilities of me

 

I hide in washes of spiked holy water

and the hazy feel of

hands on these hips,

suddenly they are the gentlest waves

 

look at me in moonlight

it’s forgiving, that cosmic candlelight

my breasts

they’re almost worldly then

 

in the dark

I see me best

in the dark

I make shapes

like a goddess

realism

(http://misterblank22.wordpress.com/2013/02/25/the-abattoir-requiem-2/)

there’s no map in my pocket

not somewhere to fashion

big red bull’s-eyes

every time I feel

 

inadequate.

 

it’s all etched in

my half-smile

full skirts

too many glasses

of red wine

red lipstick.

 

you yell out

I shrink in my seat

suddenly these flowers

in my hair

yoko ono sunglasses

look so ridiculous

 

whatever you think you know

well, you don’t know it

you are as insignificant

as insignificant gets

your words spill out

like a dripping faucet

down

down

down the drain with you.

 

my fist is dripping

with striking realism

there’s a mosaic of glass

at my feet

and I can’t remember

how I got here.

Daily Post: Syncing the Selves

Look in the mirror. Does the person you see match the person you feel like on the inside? How much stock do you put in appearances?

http://www.lerablog.org

 

I’ve blogged about body image before; when something sits on your shoulder from the time you wake to the time you close your eyes, how can it not wiggle its way into your writing? My feelings about myself are on my tongue, in my fingertips, in my hips when I’m shimmying into a pair of jeans.

So, does that girl I see in the mirror match the girl in my chest? Sometimes. Only sometimes. They like to tango back and forth, one rising to the surface while the other sleeps for a while. I could catch my reflection in the kitchen window and smile at how my hair curves just above my eyebrows that day. But then, the lights inside could simultaneously be off and that version of me just below the skin could be stumbling blindly around trying not to stub her toe on anything.

Other times I find myself glowing so brightly I’d swear you could see the sun behind my eyes, but looking in the mirror you’d only guess I was hurting. Straight lips, slumped shoulders, bad hair, bad outfit. I like the way I look just after a shower, fresh faced. Thankfully the mirror above the medicine cabinet doesn’t allow for anything I wouldn’t like to look at. Being short has its perks. Out of sight, out of mind. Sometimes.

It’ll be a forever-struggle, desperately trying to sync up those two layers of self. Once in a while there is a glimpse of that girl – a complete 360 of courage, confidence, happiness. It’s like the possessed, floundering in moments the Devil loses his grip and allows them to break through and cry for help, before going under again. Maybe that’s a bit much, but you get the point. For some it’s that serious.

As for stock in personal appearances? I fully believe that how you look on the outside is sometimes a reflection of how you feel on the inside. I also believe that we sometimes cover what we believe is inner ugliness with nice clothing and lots of lipstick (if you’re a woman…but even if you’re not, too!). But who doesn’t immediately feel somewhat better when they slip into a cute outfit?

I want to embrace my imperfections and rename them as gifts that are only mine to have.

xoxo,

Nicole Marie

How do you feel when you look in the mirror? How do you feel on the inside? Is it a perfect match?

 

The Versions of Me

Girl with the Pearl Earring.

there’s a silent art

to the versions of me

that pass like sunlight,

like seasons ,

like cigarette ashes

 

in the same speckled mirror,

in the same dim hallway,

in the smallest pane of glass

I am Picasso

a hurricane of eyes and mouth

 

in the night I am a fixture of Dali

draped over my surroundings

like cheap linen,

an examination of angles

and a questionable experience

 

on Sunday afternoons I am Van Gogh,

all honest emotion

and rough imagination,

blurred lines on canvas

beaming with coffee rings

 

but sometimes, oh sometimes

I am Vermeer’s girl;

that pearl swings from my

ear like the Queen of England

and suddenly I am romance in moonlight

 

I keep all of my selves

upon the wall with rusted nails

like antiques in a backwoods shop,

where I am beautiful in hiding

between wool hats and brass knobs

 

sift delicately through the versions of me,

be careful of rough edges,

think deeply of history and life,

long for the meaning,

sit me above the fireplace.

Romantic Monday (Week 4) – Forcing Off the Layers

Fresh faced and trying to feel good about ME.

India Arie is on repeat on our computer right now. The image of myself, something I have always, always struggled with; what do others think of me? What do they see when they look at me? What do I think of myself? How do I look in those skinny jeans? Some days I’m thin. Most days I’m fat. Every day it’s on my mind. Am I beautiful? Inside? Outside? What are my goals? I accomplished this, I didn’t accomplish that. I lost a pound. I gained a pound. I ran. I didn’t run. I wrote. I watched television instead. I ate that piece of cake.

This Romantic Monday (please click here for an absolutely beautiful post made by Mrs. Hotspur) for me, is all about self love. I may be stretching things here, since it is called romantic Monday, but with all of the different takes on the subject floating about, I figured I could make it work.

So here’s a stream of consciousness post, very true to what races through my mind each and every day, a sort of pep talk mixed with a few I-can’t-help-it downers. My thought process in all its vulnerable glory.

I hate how I look in the morning I love how I look in the morning, fresh faced with blemishes and eyeliner streaking down one cheek am I gaining weight? My face looks puffy but that’s just the sleepiness doing its thing, you won’t think the same way later, stop poking at yourself in the mirror. I’m in the shower do I look thinner today? You haven’t eaten breakfast yet it’s all empty I almost don’t want to but the hunger, the hunger is stronger than the thought of giving in to some disorder, he tells you you’re crazy every time you say it but does he really feel that way? You’ve come such a long way, a long, long way don’t do this now, she tells you, he tells you, what is there to be but happy. Either way I cannot win, too thin you’re disease, too fat he doesn’t want you, you can’t fit in, to clothes or crowds or friendships and you’re pregnant, they’ve whispered it so often you may as well be, I’m afraid they’re all thinking it. It’s the one way to stab at me to pull the tears out to force it all to the surface. Forcing off the layers I can’t even look I turn the mirror as I move and bend I closed the door I lock it so he doesn’t see but he has seen, he’s touched, he’s kissed, but mostly with the lights low a bulge here or there it lessens my value, my arguments can’t hold up my opinions do not matter I fade into the majority next to others, firm and uninhibited and strong and standing straight I am pathetic, I am lessened, I don’t know my way around it all, what good am I? You’re well-spoken, you are a graduate, you are valued, you are loved, you are looked at, really, really looked at when you catch him staring at you even in your pajamas, no bra on, no lipstick, stubs of eyelashes poking out from above those green eyes, sorry nothing on for show today, am I still me? Something else? But you like how those collarbones show themselves, I’m afraid they’ll disappear tomorrow, but do your pants still fit? They aren’t snug yet, stop paying attention to the number, how do you feel? I am broken, I am fixed, my mind is in shambles, my mind is piecing back together, you are not the only one. Never, ever alone. Don’t believe everything you think, repeat it back, go through the motions, feel everything around you, don’t waste a single second. Swallow the air and dance in the kitchen and kiss him on the mouth and force his hand around your waist at night and don’t worry about those layers of blankets in between it doesn’t matter, you are here, he is here, they are here, you’ve come such a long way, keep going, push, keep fighting, you are your own guide, you are your own destiny, you have the will, you look so good in that red lipstick.

Happy Monday.

– Nicole Marie