Lipstick & Fish
You shaved above your uterus when you were ten. A pink Gillette,
dulled by your mother. When slippery, it dragged skin. Shock mauled your nerves.
Dropping the razor, water washed it to the drain. Water washed with light pink.
You thought about your period: tampons dispensed in the mall, American Doll
Guide to Puberty, your mother’s lipstick smeared up to your cheeks. You told me.
But I was not a woman. A girl as you were. My body sprouted sparse hairs and raw
pink buds. You pulled down my roller-skate patterned panties and held a mirror to
my vagina. Spread by my fingers, it opened like the gutted belly of a fish. Exposed
to the tampon in close range, in your hand.
Rachael Crosbie is a junior English Literature major and Theatre minor at Waynesburg University; she has publication credits with Mad Swirl and Croon Magazine. Rachael loves writing poetry, taking photographs, reading anything, and hugging dogs.