I don't look at my legs very often, but this morning, warm from the sun pouring across the desk, over the sliver of floor, climbing up the mattress, across me, I pushed a bare leg out of the sheet before I'd woken. My eyes, when I opened them, landed
(more) on my limb, and I was surprised at how beautiful it was.
I am not much given to self-admiration. In my social sphere, I know exactly how I measure in every aspect, from hair to humor, and there seems to be little point in hoping to change what I am. When I sleep, my dreams always keep this order. I have never dreamed I was smarter or stupider, more lovely or repulsive. I have dreamed that things happen to me exactly, that I exactly do things that I might not do, but I have never had a dream in which my leg is so beautiful as it was this morning.
The important part of this story is that it was not a dream. My aunt, a skilled illustrator, makes much of perspective, and I remember when I was ten and drawing clumsy self-portraits that she explained this to me. She told me to look not straight-on, but from some other point of view. I tried to do this, but the mirror and me always locked into a habitual relationship: I can never get above or below my reflection. My mother gave me a pile of these stiff penciled portraits when I saw her last, some folded and angrily scratched over. I could not get the beautiful angle.
I'm transfixed by the arch of my foot, the curve of my calf. The bony protrusions of ankle and knee, landmarks on the way to my thigh. Is this where I begin or end?
(less)
