Mimic
It resembles russet photographs in Grandma’s black photo album.
Faces caught in moment.
Planning for posterity.
It resembles moth balls rolling in bottom of oak cabinet.
Hungry winged beast’s revulsion at tanned wedding dress.
It resembles delicate contents of curio cabinet.
Bloated Hummel faces frozen in mid-reaction, eyes wide.
It resembles industrious kitchen stove.
Baring smells of cabbage pockets
Roast with potatoes and baked bread.
Locked.
Pathological
You thought them warts
that warranted a dab or two of
some foul smelling medication
that swore to shrivel and shrink
the toadstools swelling on your hands.
Instead, chromosomes split and shifted
into layered lesions, wooden shingles.
Bark on your arms, waiting for fall leaves
to leave behind their seasonal marks.
They relay a lengthy scientific name expecting
you to remember how to mention it between
stares and fears and jaws dropping.
Rachel Newlon is an MFA Candidate at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado. She obtained her BA in English from Metropolitan State University in Denver, Colorado in 2010 and is looking forward to graduating from Naropa in July 2013. She has the pleasure of being published online as well as in print. She also had the pleasure of interviewing Richard Froude on Fabric and Suzanne Scanlon on Promising Young Women. She has been married for 17 years, has three amazing young boys, and looks forward to writing and teaching at the university level.