Finger Painting

[Nancy A Howells]

Finger Painting

The mirror is frosted with steam.
lazily, trace the picture of my face,
one finger paint move at a time.

A smile spreads from one left-handed finger streak
curving upwards,
two fingertip eyes
and a round face-head.
How happy I seem.

But look, behind the fingerpainting,
there's the real me,
flushed pink from the shower,
letting my hair free from a shower cap.

One fingertip full at a time,
I fingerpaint my face
in shades of moisturizer and Clinique,
filling in the lines,
coloring the shadows,
shadowing my eyes.

When I fingerpainted as a child,
the tempura paint was bright and coarse,
but my flesh-shaded palette of fingerpaints
makes me a woman today
one finger stroke painted on
at a time.

--Nancy
how...@athena.mit.edu
15 July, 1994