THE LOOKING GLASS: Poetry, by Kamala Das

THE LOOKING GLASS

Getting a man to love you is easy, only be honest about your wants as woman. Stand nude before the glass with him, so that he sees himself the stronger one, and believes it so, and you so much more, softer, younger, lovelier. Admit your admiration. Notice the perfection of his limbs, his eyes reddening under the shower, the shy walk across the bathroom floor, dropping towels, and the jerky way he hrinates. All the fond details that make, him male and your only man. Gift him all, gift him what makes you woman, the scent of long hair, the musk of sweat between the breasts, the warm shock of menstrual blood, and all your endless female hungers. Oh yes, getting a man to love is easy, but living, without him afterwards may have to be faced. A living without life when you move around, meeting strangers, with your eyes that gave up their search, with ears that hear only, his last voice calling out your name and your body which once under his touch had gleamed, like burnished brass, now drab and destitute.

(Kamala Das)

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