menarche

me-nar-che: the first menstrual cycle, the central event of female puberty.

(numbered catalog of my fossilized high-school makeup bag)


I. (glamchick pucker up lip gloss)
fourteen and i learn that womanhood is blood; 
puckered violence of a fouled river so sickly
dark, monthly fruit of a womb empty as my
lungs, unsought catharsis of two X chromosomes
and my punishment for Eve's maternal sin. they
tell you to smile, girl, beauty is lips painted on
in fertility crimson-cold. bitter, iron-y, it lingers
on my tongue for days and i can't help but
wonder - who would want to kiss me when
all i taste is blood?

II. (l'oreal paris telescopic mascara)
eyelashes flicker like curling spider legs, each
blink a twitch, a prayer for a heaven beyond this
mortal coil. fifteen, i unsheathe from a denim
exoskeleton, my fingers always tugging at the
hems of too-short skirts. i remember the girls'
bathroom echoing with our muffled screams as
we razor-cut the baby fat away from our ribs, 
inch by inch until there is nothing but bone
jagged white, bloody and beautiful.

III. (maybelline new york lineexpress eye pencil)
sixteen and i decide that i've lost enough time
chasing virginity with denial's rank desperation,
seeking absolutes that were never meant to be, 
carving chalk-ink lines into my eyes so that i might
see heaven from where i stood. instead i wish only 
for rose-sweet ambrosia, fingertips on my tongue; 
sixteen and my mouth finally learns to say it,
whisper it: les-bi-an. a pity that i still cannot
stand the sound of my own voice because it
rings with the clink of pills i never swallowed.
i am still searching for them under my teeth.

IV. (l'oreal true match foundation in nude beige)
i am finding that ours is a different sky, a rainwashed
sky, a breathless sky prosaic and empty as my lungs.
sixteen and my skin is a palimpsest i cauterize,
painting over my scars with guilt-gold leaf. i am
dancing with silence and we wax eternal under the
eyes of streetlamps. darling, she says, wiping blood
from the corner of my lips, darling, one day
you will find one and you will love her more than
perfection. this is the end but you'll be alright, 
by god, you'll be alright.

V. (covergirl smoky shadowblast eyeshadow)
so this is damnation. seventeen and i am 
unforgiven, stripped bloodless and clean at the
gates of hell. there is fire and brimstone here,
in that cataclysm, that ancestral gash between
her legs and some wounds i cannot heal with a
kiss. but for her i would try, for i have loved -
by god, i have loved.