Momma

he cannot understand how much the word
mother sounds like the word martyr
when it passes through my ears
which momma pierced when I turned four
because I wanted to wear earrings
like a Disney princess
because I wanted to feel pretty

pretty like momma
who attended aerobics classes religiously
after she had my youngest sister
despite the fact that the birth
had wrecked her insides
and left her bedridden for weeks
despite the fact that she was anemic
and the doctors advised her to take it easy
she needed to lose the baby weight
while daddy was at work

because daddy had money
daddy wore tailored suits
and daddy looked good
and daddy went on business trips
and daddy stayed late
and daddy sometimes didn't come home at all
and she thought that she could win
him back by losing fifteen pounds

so momma cooked us spaghetti
and sometimes ribs or steak or grilled cheese
and always tacos on Tuesdays
and consumed only after-dinner mints herself
the kind that come in pastel colors
and turn soft on your tongue
when you suck on them

momma curled her hair every morning
and she always let me watch
after taking a Sharpie to her curlers
and writing HOT so I remembered not to touch
she let me sit cross-legged on the counter
and after she took out the curlers
she shook her head like a lion
and I would make roaring sounds
and she would sometimes shout,
"I am woman! Hear me roar!"

and she would spend one full hour making herself up
which I always thought was an apt description
for the transformation she went through
it was like making up a new person
a new person with new features
all different colors and sizes
from the ones you were born with
all much, much prettier

but daddy left her anyway
left her for someone younger
someone with different hair
someone with plastic in her tits
someone with even more self-esteem issues
someone who didn't eat anything, even after-dinner mints
left her with three blonde little girls
who did not quite grasp the meaning
of the word "divorce" when it was explained to them
during the muted commercial break of a Christmas special

and momma's daddy left her not long after
though he'd kept a secret family in another city
they never took him from her
cancer did
he kept on through December
through the birthday he shared with my baby sister
through Christmas and New Year's
but winter was too much for an old man
whose internal organs had long since turned black

it's hard to say whether it was the funeral or the divorce
that made it so clear to me:
my momma was somebody's baby abandoned
and left to cry through the night with no one to hold her
no one to pick her up and say, It's okay, you're okay
it's hard to say at what age it would have been okay
for me to put down my baby dolls
to climb into my momma's bed and to cradle her instead

fifth-grade girls only have so much wisdom to give
but I learned that broken bones from sticks and stones
don't bruise and scar like words hurled in broken homes
and there is no nursery rhyme to teach you the best way
to ask your mother if she's been eating
or to tell her that you don't like it when she smokes so much
because Grandpa smoked that much too

I was a smart girl and science was my favorite subject
I stayed after school to learn the parts of the heart
I was excited to tell momma that two boys fainted
because of all the blood, but not me
but elementary school science never taught me
how much wine is fine for a 98-lb. woman
with an addictive personality
and how much will cause her to forget
to pick her daughter up from science club

though it did show me what it's like
to hold a heart in your hands
and momma says that having a baby
is just like wearing your heart outside your body
I always wanted to trap hers under glass to keep it safe
because I didn't trust her ribcage to do the job

but my momma was somebody's baby, too
and she ripped my heart from its safe place
with words not worth repeating
oblivious to the damage she'd done
the way that I'd ripped her favorite pair of gold earrings
from her ears as an infant reaching out for anything

she left me bleeding and then looked around
like she was unaware of what she'd done
all because I replaced her wine with juice
and her pot with crushed leaves
and her cigarettes with cancer facts
I taught myself to make spaghetti which she never touched
I stayed up all night cleaning the kitchen which she never noticed
I hated my stepdad for fueling her depression with drugs
instead of telling her that she was perfect the way she was

and all I was trying to say was that she was loved
but she couldn't see it, not at the time
and I hated her for that
so that's what I started telling her
I watched a little piece of her commit suicide each time that I said it
though it seemed to be what she wanted
to kill herself bit by bit
at the time it made me hurt less
I felt stronger each time those words crashed
through the gates of my unkissed lips

but now it just makes me scared
scared of broken condoms
of forgotten pills
of little pink plus signs
scared of seeing my heart outside my body
in the tiny hands of someone predisposed to all my flaws
and all of my mother's

he cannot understand how much the word
daughter sounds like the word martyr
when it passes through my ears
or through my mother's
which are scarred because of me
and my need to grab ahold of who I love
to pull them toward me no matter how much it hurts