In the funhouse mirrors, I am
echoing. The girl beside me reaches out
and I leave fingerprints on the glass.
My hand mimics a thousand
others: dropping
from mirror to thigh.
I have grown up looking
like my mother. I catch her round eyes,
structured cheeks ten times in a distorted
one thousand and don’t recognize
the others. The mirror frames twist
and I remember this is a maze but the
rippling glass is reminiscent of
my bathwater,
swelling,
and my indiscernible
reflections—ambiguous
and clouded and malforming. I take this as a message
from whatever deity
is out there; a reminder
of the one thousand stories in my blood—and a
reminder that I bear their weight.
I bear the face of a woman I will never
meet, who I recognize
in every warped looking-glass.
Together, we drink tea.
Distantly, I hear a hand on the door.
slam
The man running the funhouse knocks— asks if I’m
lost, calls me ma’am
fifty-three times and bursts in. Peels me
from the glass.
I leave my infinitely great grandmother
behind. And all my reflections
drink alone.