Confession: I forget to smell the flowers.
There they are, white and soft, nestled
in that green I can’t identify. Language
returns from 10th grade Biology—stamen,
ovule, filament. The words feel good. Always
better than the real thing, a weight in my brain,
like I might hold them, a memory bouquet.
There was the formaldehyde on frog day,
and my lab partner’s wintergreen gum,
his adam’s apple bobbing beneath
a hemp choker. It was a confusing time.
What should one want—to tear into
the frog’s embryonic skin, flacid and gray
when I poked with a knife? Or should I
recoil, let the lab partner do this manly
work? I was learning how to be female,
to dissect each moment for clues. Directions:
To dissect is not to ‘cut up,’ but to ‘expose
to view.’ I was learning to reveal myself in parts—
dorsal, ventral, lateral—a lifetime collection
of rules. If you have a female frog,
remove and place the ovaries in the tray.
I was learning to conceal. We worked
together, the lab partner and I,
and made it to the triangle-shaped
heart before he ran to the bathroom
and threw up. I pressed on, forceps
and probe. Our ovaries were filled
with eggs. Reflect: Notice the heart
has 3 chambers. How many chambers
does your heart have?” I answered
everything that was asked of me,
and double-checked my work.
What should one want
to be obedient, or to be free?
But that was many years ago,
and I am writing about beauty today,
not dead frogs, not the way a heart
builds walls. I bend to smell my flowers,
and can already see they are past
their prime. The milky flesh turning
to yellow-brown, the faint scent
I hope to redeem me thick with rot.
I tug a petal but the stem protests,
and my palm unfurls like a hug opened.
What am I trying to save? Not the girl
told to observe the relationship between
organ and function. Not the girl who didn’t
say no. Conclude: What insight do you have
into the relationship between life and death?
I leave the last question blank.
