Early in the morning You prepare to face the world Like the mall Or school Or the mall You face the mirror, Just a piece of glass With a dark background You’ve deified Ooh! You need eye make-up You reach for your eyeliner Max Factor’s finest And open your eyes Forcibly Like some deer caught in the Stage lights Now, you begin to line your eyes with a swipe A million children’s stomachs growling for zilch Swipe Mosquito-infested mothers digging for lunch at Payatas Swipe Cuts on a little knee from scrap metal Swipe Oh look! You’re tearing up Liquid fake crystal Forming on the dusty window to your soul Feel it form in the corner of your eye Feel it drip like cloud-seed rain Feel it streak your powdered, masked face Oh wait! You can’t feel it You’ve gone numb But those tears fall and fall Perfect! Just the way you wanted
I wrote this poem three years ago for a creative writing class in uni. I was inspired by Elizabeth Bishop's "In the Waiting Room".
I no longer write this way and find my old poems too sarcastic. I guess that's just natural to critique your own work.