She cut her finger while slicing bread,
no one gasped, or winced
with her exclamation of "****"
aimed towards the bent, saw-toothed steel.
She bloodied a kleenex,
then strangled her fingertip
with a band-aid.
She didn't mind the sight of blood.
She'd grown used to it in childhood.
From scratching the welts
left by mosquitoes till they were crimson.
She remembered accompanying her little sister
to a routine checkup
and the nurse looked down at her scarred legs
and asked if there was anything wrong
with the big one.
It was the first time
she learned to feel shame
for her scars.
In fourth grade she had a crush
on the class clown.
She liked his black hair
and blue eyes
and he made her laugh.
He ignored her.
Later, she found out
he called her pimple-face behind her back
by then, she no longer cared
what he though, feelings had faded,
but the pain of being told
you were second to last
in the classes "Beautiful" rating
(second only to the freckled girl with tiny eyes).
She learned her crooked teeth were things to be ashamed of.
Braces helped, but four years of wires
and widening her tiny jaw
with medieval, key driven devices
that prevented normal speech,
were hardly an improvement.
She learned pain was beauty,
but being able to take pain well
was not beautiful.
Being able to run swiftly,
having monkey-bar calloused hands
and strong arms,
only made her unfeminine.
She did not sit placidly on the swing-set
admiring her fingernails,
screaming,
when a fly buzzed past her ear.
She rescued frost-winged bees from being crushed,
laying them gently in the grass.
She held back tears when the asphalt stripped her palms.
She wanted to be brave.
Respected for the strength she thought she had.
That did not come till ten years later.
He called her a water nymph,
jumping from rock to rock like a small child,
though childhood had long since gone.
Laughed as she caught salamanders.
She cut her toe while they were walking together.
It began to bleed.
She said nothing, thinking it would stop,
letting the blood fill her shoe.
He panicked a little, wanted to carry her.
She refused.
But he bandaged her foot, gently,
like a morbid Cinderella,
as she washed the blood out of her sandal.
He complimented her graceful run.
Things she'd wanted noticed
for ten years.
She didn't know when she would find
another
who saw her, as he did.