Baubles From Bones: Issue 2
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Measuring My Childhood

Mariel Herbert

Mother called it a birth defect

my right hand parted down the middle

Biblical like the sea. Her daily blessings

for the righteous did not rescue me

from children with salted fingers.

Hid my cloven hoof in the sacred

fringe of my shawl, wove prayers

in rushes and reeds. But my burning

mind overflowed chapped lips

scraped against the desks abandoned

at the front of the class. Teacher brushed

off my questions, gathered her pupils

in a parsley leaf skirt.

Taunts trailed as fins from the school bus

stuffed fish jaw, flesh flapping. I ran

through clouds of Granny Smith gas. Raw

pink skin itched, knees popped, legs locked

into salmon scales. When Mother slept

I scratched trenches, shaped ichthyic

topography beneath my mattress.

Puberty came blazing in broad daylight

raining buy-one-get-one-free gift cards

for coarse hair. Mother caught me sobbing

in the bathroom, sticking bits of toilet paper

on little piggy bristles.

She used maternal coercion, brought me

to experts to say I must fit in with girls

my age. Cattle prods buried in tsks and

spit prepared and force fed. I'm half

fish/half goat, seasoned-plated-garnished

for two Leviathan on a five-star beach--

making out all over a new world.

Baubles From Bones: Issue 2
Available for purchase:
Physical
Digital
Subscribe to Patreon

Mariel Herbert