Malak Mattar, Untitled (detail), 2024, charcoal on paper
A Photograph of Her Showering
As passionless, burned-out, dusty shells, we dislike love poems . . . As [one of our editors] says, why not “text me a photograph of her showering”?
I am enclosing, as text, the photo
you ask for. Though my husband
refuses, I make this in secret
and print it black over white. Though
the angles and lighting are tough
to nail down, and the process
makes my whole body a long face
for tears as the spray breaks over
my scalp and rolls down.
Though my right hand withers,
as I rake damp hair into rows.
Though the cheap curtain cleaves
to my thigh, I peel it off like a rind
teased from its fruit in one strip.
You thought I was dusty, a shell.
You said I was burned out,
but now my skin is slapping and slick,
the camera demanding more arch
and frontal. When I read your note
I was spitting with anger. I could
not get your eyes off my nipples,
my breasts, but now I make you
this square handful of edges,
a black-and-white chip where my ass
hangs over tan lines like a sun
without set, where stretch marks
like fault lines ride over each thigh
and a pocked scar stabs into my shoulder.
Once I knew men like you and tried
to be sexy but in the shower
I only got soaked. On the bed
where I practiced I only looked
posed. In cabins on nights with your jars
full of scotch I hoped you might
see past what you saw and fuck me,
but now it seems we have both changed
our minds. Here I am. In a poem,
just breath-long, I am perfect.
I send you this picture because
a photo of showering is just wet
and sex, but the poem lays down
its camera and hands me a towel,
knows the route I send it
over my calves, over my nape
and around. How many
flashes and clicks turn a love poem
around into only a woman to
fuck you? Fuck you.

Elizabeth Langemak
Elizabeth Langemak lives in Philadelphia. Her work has appeared in Day One, Shenandoah, AGNI, Colorado Review, Subtropics, Beloit Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. (updated 12/2014)