Poem: Mom's High School Reunion

Mom’s High School Reunion

INT: LADIES ROOM ACROSS FROM THE GYMNASIUM

She knots her hair

debris stuck in her curls

shredded notes

and fragments of glass

stabbing out
from her raven-pitched crown

the objects she carries
as the burden of her birth
show the cracks of labor

the dried river bed

bifurcating across her palms

the crossing
serration of stained glass

clenches the brush
as she covers the potholes of youth

years of advertising campaigns

magazine covers

anti-intellectual agendas

tainted her image

lead in the lipstick

pesticides

in her blush

a flock of ravens in her eyeliner

prayers
stuffed in her crows feet

picking at her cuticles
as she enters the gym
hoping
no one will recognize her