Makeup

My mother does not trust

women without it.

What are they not hiding?

Renders the dead living

and the living more alive.

Everything I say sets

the clouds off blubbering

like they knew the pretty dead.

True, no mascara, no evidence.

Blue sky, blank face. Blank face,

a faithful liar, false bottom.

Sorrow, a rabbit harbored in the head.

The skin, a silly one-act, concurs.

At the carnival, each child's cheek becomes

a rainbow. God, grant me a brighter myself.

Each breath, a game called Live Forever.

I am small. Don't ask me to reconcile

one shadow with another. I admit—

paint the dead pink, it does not make

them sunrise. Paint the living blue,

it does not make them sky, or sea,

a berry, clapboard house, or dead.

God, leave us our costumes,

don't blow in our noses,

strip us to the underside of skin.

Even the earth claims color

once a year, dressed in red leaves

as the trees play Grieving.