Size 3

My mother tells me she used to believe in 

abortion. Said her body wasn't ready to 

cradle stretch marks that would tuck into her.

She is addicted to alignment. Thinks the arcs

of her stomach should run parallel with her hip bone.

she was so afraid her thighs would spread wider than 

wire hangers, she made her body spit up its insides.

Her blood settling in puddles on

our bathroom floor. She tells me "these are 

how angels look." She can't tell when a body 

is wounded from starving. My mother has

always fit in a size 3. Now, I watch as her

Stomach pushes past her chest like plastic

hangers bent from wet clothes. Hates the way 

her skin laps over itself. No longer fitting into

my fathers desires. She tells me, she doesn't

know how it feels for him to tread his fingertips 

down spreading stretch marks. She's sick of elastic

waist bands. Wishes the mirror captured the woman

who blended in the creases of bed sheets. The insides 

of her thighs are bruised. Jeans swing in her closet

because they hang uneven. She doesn't know how 

it feels for them to not brush past each other. "Kyndall

go to the gym with me, I'll pay you." Like I wouldn't do

it if she just asked. Her body hold yeild signs. Vulnerability 

etches itself over her skin. I'm scared to ask if this outfit

makes me too big. My sister taunts me at dinner.

Says the youngest always ends up being the bigest.

Jagging her fingers in my side, howling "you're the fattest,

just stop eating." I want to believe that beauty doesn't

always have to fit into a size 3. Yesterday, I stretched

a wire hanger so far it broke, like my mother did the day

she filled trash bags with clothes too tight for her thick 

wooled body. I want to believe that God made me with motive.

Not wanting me heavy with pounds or skin sucked bone.

Wire hanger are not meant to bend and mothers are not

break. We all turn our body sideways in mirrors sometimes 

but eventually, we have to face ourselves.