Once a month or so
I sit at my altar
And I pray.
It started when I was thirteen
At the foot of my mother’s bed
She’d pick at my cheeks and chin
With a device that looks like
It could’ve tortured some
Unwitting treasonist
In the medieval days of yore.
She’d say
Let me show you
How to flush your skin
Of its mistakes
Drain it of the stray marks
With the whisk of my wand.
It wasn’t until I was fifteen
I found the tool to become
A workable scab to pick at
Obsess and worship .
I’d spend hours in front of the mirror
Perched on my bathroom counter
Like Victorian ladies in a powder room do
Or, did.
Lancing my face raw
Plucking my bushy brows straw-thin
Scrutinising my nose
Sitting like a mantelpiece
On my face, gaudy and
Clashing with the tapestries
Studded with blemishes.
Subject to the wrath of my
Fine, slender sword
I wage war on my face
Ever the perfectionist
Trying to repair the irrevocable
Thinking my unwavering devotion
And my deliberate hand
Will be faith enough.
Until I resign my altar
Sometime after midnight
With red, wounded visage
Satisfied, like a blind believer.
