POETRY

Bathroom Mirrors
By Michelle Correa
Entry to the 19th Cornelio Faigao Writers Workshop (April, 2002)

This here is a ten-watt bulb above me.
And this here is a bathroom mirror facing me.
Note how my skin glows like a yellow pear,
and how, when I curve my lips into a smile,
my teeth look like like perfectly aligned white marble blocks.

Now this here is a sixty-watt bulb above me.
And this here is another bathroom mirror facing me.
Observe how the peas ripens
and ripens until blotches spurt in clusters,
and how the marble blocks turn moldy,
and I cannot bring myself
to smile.