The Bathroom Mirror

Give the lights a sickly yellow glow

Let me reflect 

The scribbled-on stall doors and brightly-colored posters

Framing her face, to remind her 

That she’s trapped

here, with her thoughts and a rancid smell

Mixed with clorox. 

Smudge your fingerprints upon me

To distort the world even further, turn her skin

Ashen, make her wonder

If there is a stain on her shirt,

Or something else she can’t wash off. 

Splash me with murky sink-water

So the droplets dry on her image like tears,

And the rushing faucet that she can't 

Figure out how to turn off

Rings in her ears.

Make it so she can't look away, let me mold

Her opinions of herself like modeling clay, 

So that when she leaves

She knows she’ll come back to face my

Smile, cracked by a long-ago fist

As if the thing staring back will ever change.