Thu Anh Nguyen

My Mother Sizes Me

You came to me shaking, cradling tissue
in your palm so carefully that I didn’t recognize
your softness, open to me for once. Do you like it?
you asked before unwrapping. I don’t know
where it came from. I knew the minute I saw it
slim and pale green, impossibly small. A perfect circle
that would never fit on me again. Back then,
I bruised myself to take it off
would have smashed it if I loved it less.
That summer I was angry with you over
everything, not knowing where to put it
or the bracelet, except away in your makeup drawer
with Clinique and Estee Lauder, each bag open
and overfull with palettes and powders,
promises to highlight, enhance, define. I knew
you’d never find it, knew you never wore makeup
after you left the mall; no one ever looked as good
in their own lighting. I didn’t understand what it meant
that we could only bond over beauty counters,
bear each other more easily with our lips smacking
in front of mirrors to shades of Black Honey
and Bruised Plum. Now you can only stare and wait
wanting me to try again, so sure the bangle still fits
but it sticks at my knuckles, my body stubborn
to the past, your will. I wonder what
I’ll have to do to prove it to you. You grab soap
in one hand, my wrist in the other, and my laughter is
the only lubricant I have for this failure.
I could hide it again, slip the jade under
concealer and compacts, the free gifts
we spent weekends chasing
and forgot. I wonder if I could face you,
and still we’d end up here: heads bent over
the sink, letting you mold and make me,
breaking myself to make it fit.

Thu Anh Nguyen is a Vietnamese American poet whose poetry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and has been featured in journals such as the Hayden’s Ferry Review, Southern Humanities Review, Cider Press Review, and Crab Orchard Review among others. The author’s poems were also named as a semi-finalist for the Auburn Witness Poetry Prize for the Southern Humanities Review. She was honored with a writing residency with The Inner Loop Poetry Series in Washington, D.C. She also writes about equity, justice, and community through literacy. Her essays on the importance of reading diverse literature have been featured in Literacy Today.