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by Millicent Machell

When I was sixteen,

Every night before I slept

I would wind a silk scarf around my waist

And tie it so tight that it disappeared into my folds of flesh.

 

As time went on I used a larger cotton scarf

To tie over the top

So my torso seemed to be two halves -

Two squares of Lego connected with a careless gap in between.

 

Sometimes I think that those scarves held me together -

Bulging like meat through a butcher's string.

Or perhaps they were what split me apart

But they never broke my skin.

 

There's the faintest purple scar-band

That snakes around the skin of my waist

Slightly shiny, as if polished more times than the rest of me.

I wonder, when it fades completely, will that girl -

Cinching herself with all her strength -

Will she fade too? A painting too long in the sun.

 

And if she saw me writing this, would she take her mother's silver scissors

And cut the silk scarf in half?

I wonder.

 

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