In aubergine,
And my kind wanting lies,
The rise and fall of feet, a formula's delta,
That I once called 'who I am'.
In thumping heartbeat and trembling fingers,
The graceless clumsy of nerve to embrace,
That fierceness seen once in the mirror.
There for a second, or less than a second,
Just before blinking my eyes.

In letting them choke on my lashes,
I steeled myself for the reveal;
Saw what I'd always believed of myself,
Named her too much of a burden.
A slick thief of my mother's love,
That canted towards disappointment.
Something called falsely pretty,
Instead of more accurate words,
Like a sly and foolish imposter,
An amateur of imitation,
Masked as a girl with pride.

I traced every deceit,
A cord, or a rune, on her body.
Twisting words that fell off her tongue,
As easy as catching a snowflake.
Those ones where she claimed she was smart,
And deserved to be cared for, somehow;
Pressed into her elbow's hollow,
The dips and the swells of her shallow crests,
And the unearned keel of her hair.

Standing there, wishing for someone, anyone
Real to approach her and rend,
Down the walls of her cowardly fortress,
Exposing all of her nothing,
And petty shoplifting;
Leave her there at the apex,
Of all that she was and could not be,
To drown inside the hot blackness of oil,
And what she perceived to be justice.
Not thinking, for all her lost, learned logic,
That these thoughts, too, could be lies.