 |
I learn that pumpkin pie
and lavender
are aphrodisiacs. |
|
I learn that the French term for crabs
is papillons d’amour—
butterflies of love. |
|
I learn that the average
speed of ejaculation
is twenty-eight miles per hour. |
|
And I’m just about
to learn the identity
of “the next awesome sex prop” |
|
(which
the magazine says
is probably in my purse!) |
|
when,
much to my chagrin,
the nurse calls me in. |
|
 |
Eighteen years ago, when Dr. Stone
squirted the icy gel across my stomach,
then turned to examine my womb
on the pulsating screen |
|
and I saw Samantha for the first time,
saw her heart fluttering like a tiny fan
with the effort of pumping that blood,
my blood, through her veins, |
|
saw the shimmering beginnings
of the perfect little person
that my body was so effortlessly
knitting, |
|
I couldn’t have imagined
how I’d feel on this day,
eighteen years later,
when Dr. Stone would squirt that gel again |
|
then turn to examine my ovaries
on the pulsating screen,
and announce so casually,
as if talking about the weather: |
|
| “You can stop using your diaphragm now.” |
|
 |
It happens for the first time
on the very day I turn fifty— |
|
a scrim of sweat
cloaks my body, |
|
beading on my upper lip,
misting on my forehead, |
|
gathering in a steaming pool
between my shoulder blades |
|
as if a tiny cup of liquid lightning
in each one of my cells |
|
has just bubbled up, burst ablaze,
and cremated me, |
|
flashes
to ashes, |
|
bust
to dust. |
|
 |
On what day,
at what hour,
at which tell-me-it-ain’t-so moment |
|
did you finally come
to the blow-to-the-solar-plexus realization
that your daughter had switched over |
|
from being so proud of you
that she actually wanted to bring you in
for show-and-tell, |
|
to being so humiliated
by everything you say or do
or even think about doing |
|
that she is
no longer willing
to be seen in public with you? |
|
(Unless,
of course,
you offer to take her shopping.) |
|
 |
Samantha and I are cruising
the Neiman Marcus Last Call Sale—
because who can afford
to shop at Neiman’s
when it’s not having a sale? |
|
I’m admiring my daughter
as she glides through the racks—
her back so straight
she looks as if she’s balancing
a rare book on her head. |
|
I glance in a mirror at my own posture
and am appalled at how
my head’s jutting forward,
as if it’s trying to win a race
with the rest of my body. |
|
I’m stunned by the gorilla-esque curve
my spine seems to have taken on,
as though determined to prove
once and for all
that evolution really did happen. |
|
I snap my shoulders back
and pull myself up,
arrow straight,
like a child being measured
against a wall. |
|
Then, a few minutes later,
while we’re browsing through
a mountain range of marked-down panties,
I see an old woman sifting through
the thongs on the other side of the table— |
|
the hump
on her back
so enormous
she resembles
a camel. |
|
She looks up suddenly
and catches me staring.
I avert my eyes
and am confronted with my reflection
in yet another mirror— |
|
which is when
I notice that my
frighteningly King-Kongish posture
has snuck right back up
on me... |
|
Oh no!
Is this how
it all began for her?
Twenty years from now, am I going to be
the hunchback of Neiman Marcus? |
|
 |
It’s so sad
to think |
|
that just moments
from now |
|
you
will be gone |
|
and I’ll
be a cow. |
