By Jenny Rebecca Griffin
They laugh together,
just two of them—they laugh like they
are mad-crazy
at something I know if I asked, it
wouldn’t be funny because it is between
him and her.
In the mirror my stomach
bulges pregnantly
as I watch; it increases in size
and in resemblance to all the cakes
I must have eaten in my life.
I turn sideways to assess.
She sits in his lap and curls
her fingers into his malleable hair,
gently holds, massages his arms
as if to say nothing has ever fit
more perfectly in her hands.
One arm and then the other.
I brush my teeth
to a dismal pulse, incessant
stresses of tedium,
ignoring the toothpaste
dribbling down my chin.
He sings bluntly into the serene
night. She nestles
next to him, close enough
that her heart’s cadence
becomes his metronome,
her breath now feeding his music.
I think there is more to me
than this face and body.
I pant as I reach my tongue
out as long as it will go,
try to see past the mirror’s
fabricated copy of my face,
into the blackness of
my throat.