Drenched in Reflection
Cause we’re not allowed in public, not really.
My mom thinks everyone is enamored with my beauty,
But I know they are surprised to see one of us
Living. Outside is a stage & I’m a pretty player.
I love what I see on the other side of myself.
A man tells my mother he couldn’t take the doll,
Because my heels, my legs, my tattoos stopped
Him from looking me in the eye. He wants to meet
Me, to apologize for eating me from my sole up.
He’s the worst I’m aware of, but not alone in lust-
Filled gaze givers. All I want to tell my mother
About me. How they like my parts. She thinks
I’m unclockable until I speak & I know she’s trying
Not to blame me for any danger I dodge. Desire
Is in the eye of the beholder, but I live in the empty
Hands of discombobulated bastards. Disintegrate
In their salivating. I am shards of selves
They wish to suck between their teeth.
Copyright © 2025 by Jzl Jmz. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on July 14, 2025, by the Academy of American Poets.
“My mother loves me very much and, because I’m a narcissist, I assume it’s because I look like her. I know there’s more to it. She calls me her heart-outside-her-body. As a child, she was inhumanly perfect, although like God, one to be feared. Now, her humanity makes me want to live. Every day, she’s the self-appointed head of my fan club. Still, there are bits of my transsexuality that exist beyond her knowledge. There are some dangers she doesn’t see. There are dangers I don’t tell her about. This is me trying to clear the mirror between us.”
—Jzl Jmz
Jzl Jmz
Jzl Jmz is a Black poet, artist, and teacher from Los Angeles. She is the author of three poetry collections: Local Woman (Nightboat Books, 2025); The Black Condition ft. Narcissus (Nightboat Books, 2019); and Mannish Tongues (Platypus Press, 2017). A Lambda Literary Fellow, she lives in Portland, Oregon.