Mirror Stage

I look at Babygirl in the full frame mirror on the back of our closet door and we look back at me and Babygirl says, you know, it’s hard to see

ur clit when ur fat. She isn’t mean. (Fat isn’t a mean word.) She’s right. About the fat and about the practical difficulties of bending down

to see our clitoris. We remember how hard it has always been to see our body. In a different poem, Jay knows he can’t be the only one

who stood up on a toilet seat so the mirror could see where belly fat touched upper thighs. He’s right. Me and Babygirl’s bathroom growing up

didn’t have a mirror big enough or in front of the toilet enough so we stood on the edge of the iron claw-foot tub to see what the small cabinet mirror

could show us. In one version of this memory, we hold onto the shower curtain for balance and our little girl feet slip. We tear the shower curtain down

and bash our head against the cold tub and sob. In another version, we step up, arch our foot around the curved tub rim and shy away from the cold.

In that version, we abandon the bathroom and sneak into Mama’s room. We carefully move folded sweaters and camisoles from the old trunk

at the end of Mama’s cattycorner bed frame and stand our feet on steel rivets or whatever it is that pressed shapes into the soles of us.

Mama’s dresser topped mirror is wide and short. We can see how our belly folds over onto our thighs and how pulling skirts up past our belly button

hides this. Hiding is the key. Layering camisoles and shirts under shirts hides us from ourselves too. Mama’s mirror is too short for us to see our face.

We are cut off. The mirror shows breasts, belly, thighs. Before I could see Babygirl in the mirror looking back at me, we were in the business of covering

ourselves up. Babygirl brings up her clit and calls it ours because we can feel it changing. (It’s easier to think about it as Babygirl’s clit. It’s easier,

but it doesn’t hold up. I rub testosterone gel into my upper arms every day and Babygirl’s clit starts to feel different. See? The logic doesn’t work

if we’re disconnected.) Babygirl brings up our clit and looking at it because it’s always been sensitive but now it’s extra sensitive,

like “we’ve had to rethink how I have sex” sensitive. If I made a list for the steps of me thinking about me, myself, and I having sex

it would read: 1. remember the image of breasts, belly, thighs framed in Mama’s mirror; 2. forget about that and imagine yourself skinny

from your neck down to your knees; 3. reframe that thought because remember, fat isn’t a bad word; 4. imagine your body becomes a flesh

toned blur starting at your collar bone down to your knees. add in nipples floating somewhere in there and silky wetness somewhere under nipples but

above your knees. 5. now! Think about your clit and how it feels when you touch it and how it used to feel before you started T.

Check all the boxes quickly so by the time my beloved takes off my shirt, I’m ready with my body tucked into little boxes so I can feel some of myself.

Babygirl reminds me that we haven’t looked at our clit since I started testosterone or for several years for that matter. U have a tiny mirror

on ur bookshelf. So I take the mirror and go into the bathroom and sit on the grey bath mat and spread my legs wide.

Balance the mirror and my phone with flashlight on, to look between the fat folds of my labia. I spread my labia apart and look at my clit which looks

like a clit.

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