How I Am Not My Mother, Emily O'Neill

To be only bone. To be thin
chrome handle bars on a quiet bicycle.
Small & held like a pebble
underneath my tongue, assassin
of thirst. She used to run, before
all of the children. She used to be
knife fine. I saw a picture
of her glowing frown, her hips
with their ashtray curves. Muse
at dock’s end, endless black olive hair.
That’s what they called her:
Olive Oil. Angular, and animated.
I tore my voice off trying
to be uncanny, porcelain.
I want to be the same ghost.
I jog around the block,
a gasping hole in my sail.
Force my feet into tiny
wooden shoes and bleed.
Hope to become a lens
flare. A stoic.
Like her.