by Elizabeth Hoyle
Can one be ignorant of the shapes
that make them up?
All my life, I’ve lived
in a zoo of shapes
complex and simple
and I’ve known the labyrinth
that lies just deep below
my epidermis, yet I haven’t
taken the time to explore
my own shapes.
Legs hipwidth apart, palms out, head up.
The mirror reflects my anatomical position
and the more and more I stare,
the more and more I see circles.
The small ones that compose my palms,
the ones I wish were smaller
that make up my bottom,
the half circles of my heels
that find their closure in the curves
of my insteps.
The barely-seen circles of my hip bones
that lead upward
to the sideways ovals of ribs
underneath my protruding breasts.
The circles don’t stop there.
They travel up my shoulders,
down my knees, around the ends of my toes,
fingers, elbows.
My face, my nostrils, my eyes, my ears,
all these are made of so many, so big, so small, so ugly, so beautiful
circles.
And circles, by their nature,
are a microcosm of eternity.
Elizabeth Hoyle is a writer whose work has been featured Oddball Magazine, DoveTales: An International Journal of the Arts, and The Wayfarer, as well as in other online and print publications. She was born and raised in the mountains of southern West Virginia, where she lives still. She makes her online home at https://entwinedinpages.wordpress.com
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