Fall 2007 / Spring 2008

Skin

by Lyn Lifshin

It was just there, nothing to think about except for a
skinned knee or the bruise on thighs I never thought
would be thin enough, even posing a la Natalie
Wood in pin up shots where everyone said I
looked like her. Now, skin seems to want

its own life, as if tired of being a mask to camouflage
what rages and flows. In the medicine cabinet,
shears to thin my hair. At 7, beauticians cooed at my
thick mahogany curls, then snipped out half of them.
Now I gulp biotin to make it grow as it was,

wouldn't mind those plump rosy cheeks the tall thin
drama teacher said gave me magnificent coloring. All
I cared about, would have given up all for was to be
thin, so thin I could wear whites and prints. I think of
my mother in her last months, a size six, finally sighing

“I used to want to be able to eat all the chocolate I wanted
and still stay thin and now I can, I can't eat it.” In a car
front seat, spread against the steering wheel and the dash,
my skin glowed in Drive In light. Though I thought there
was too much of it, it was taut and tight. If I didn't love

a photograph, it wasn't because of skin. My waist small even
when the rest of me seemed too curvy, my mother's bare midriff,
middy dresses flaunted what I hoped anyone who glanced at
would die to hold as if being held and touched was all there
was. Skin as a flag, skin thru sheer blouses or under felt, a lure.

Now I wait for my skin to betray me, crack along my lips
as if what I've said was too harsh. Or bruise when even those I want
come near. The blue veins like road maps I'd rather keep hidden,
along with poison ivy scars. Missing a layer of fat, I feel
exposed, am always freezing. I want my skin to ease, be at home,

feel it is not shuddering like music and not like a video of
where I've been but to move with me, smell like a field of new
snow where what happens next is all there is