Teenagehood as Effigy

O our salicylic saint, thou
patroness of Pinterest boards
& training bras, help us through
these budding nights, the world
so hard & cold. Like wax, our
mothers’ minds have suddenly
been rent from us, pulling out
the germ of expectation. Our form-
lessness horrifies us as the void
horrified God. We are the desert
& its jackal, the pyramid without
its battery, a process no longer
on speaking terms with becoming.
Our skin ripples in our heat,
beaded with sorrowful mysteries
in which we are lost & can’t be
drowned, swarming & shrieking
in this valley of mirrors. Full of
face, we detest our skin because
of thy judgment. To thee as to
perfection, we carve up our thighs,
our strife, our bleakness, & our
cope, a demand & a refusal to be seen.
Three times have we denied our-
selves, four candles have we set
in our hollowed eyes, the fruit of
our gloom. O serpentine O sloughing O
fleet-burning Fury, lead us not into
frustration & deliver us from people
who would perceive us as we are—
scared, self-immolating stars.