Someday I’ll Love
—after Frank O’Hara / after Roger Reeves / after Ocean Vuong
I love it when I’ve found a way to rip
a scab off my scalp and pull it through
my hair. I love blue eyeshadow and eyes
that look big. I like turning around
and seeing in the mirror, and not
seeing because my hair obscures
my eyes. I love The Picture
of Dorian Gray, and I think I saw him
backstage. This time he looked
hollow. I love softness—when I run
my fingers through my hair. I love
when the strands come loose. I even love
the ball of blue paint on my clavicle.
But when it melts into eyelids,
into flesh, there’s no beauty
in a poem or in my face. Blue turns
to gray. Glitter to dust. Skinny to dead.
What is art no one ever thought
beautiful, not even the creator?
What is a body if it’s never been
a muse? A note without sustain? Someday
I’ll love the velociraptor of truth
in the mirror, spelling it out with blue
lipstick. Someday I’ll love
the words enough to write
my name with the same
monotonous signature. Right now,
with the blue paint on my t-shirt, I can’t
help but love bleeding
for the evidence, making myself
cry, and rituals of pacing to the same
song. (How people dance to the sound
of bullets if it has a catchy rhythm.) Some
hopeful day, I’ll see the light
through the windchime
of hair in my face. Someday I’ll stop
putting people on pedestals to prove
to myself I’m small. Someday I won’t loathe
every person that loves me. Someday
I’ll understand. Someday I’ll love _______.
Khadija Khadjimedova won third place in the Charles Crupi Memorial Poetry Contest for Michigan High School Students. She is a student at Interlochen Arts Academy.
