January 2021

MATH

Math is not real. 

Why did Pythagoras get to decide how to measure a triangle? 

Why is pi equal to 3.14

Math beyond division is not real. 

Maybe freshman and sophomore year (high school) algebra. 

Not even then. 

Freshman and sophomore year (high school) do not exist to me

A girl with a chubbier face and uncomfortable smile looks at me from the yearbooks. 

I think of all the baby weight I finally managed to lose. 

I can wear shorts around my uncle now, according to my mother. 

My butt isn’t fat anymore. 

My chest has deflated. 

But, my stomach is flat! 

I don’t have a double chin when I look down. 

Nothing to keep me warm. 

I wasn’t fat. 

But still, the 30-50 pounds I lost seemed to be the right amount so I can fit. 

Fit into imaginary places that years of conditioned womanhood has tried to cram my Nana’s big hips and my Mema’s big thighs—that are not recessive in my family. 

Fit into the prom dress the way my mother wants me to. 

Fit into a lovers arms. 

Fit into his shirts without fabric clinging to me. 

Like math, eating disorders are painful. 

Unlike math, eating disorders are real. 

How do you tutor a young girl to love food again? 

Chubby face, uncomfortable smile. 

Slender face, still uncomfortable. 

Cheeks still cover my eyes when I smile. 

Time to eat and study. 

UNTOUCHABLE

My father, sits in a chair in Missouri 

I sit in his chair in Colorado 

Feeling brown worn fabric melt into my skin. 

Unable to move. 

Unable to touch my conscience. 

I sit in his shirt. 

NFL on the TV. 

Broncos losing. 

I want to be sad for them, but I don’t care at all about football. 

He acts too cool to care, but I know it touches him. 

I roll the hem of a white “Hanes” shirt between my thumb and forefingers. 

Rubbing cotton like a magic lamp. 

Rubbing like tapping red shoes. 

“No place like home” repeats. 

I want him home. 

I reach out to him. 

Distance is all I can feel. 

My first heartbreak was my father. 

I watched bright Chevy lights back out a dark driveway.

I replace all my lightbulbs in my house with red heat lamps.

The ones we hang up for the baby chickens.  

I walk around with a head light on. 

I watched Chevy lights appear in the driveway. 

I reach for my dad, and feel him there. 

Distance closed. 

Broncos still lose.