twenty four may

Pentimento

pentimento
noun
pen·ti·men·to | \ ˌpen-tə-ˈmen-(ˌ)tō
Definition of pentimento
A reappearance in a painting of an original drawn or painted element which was eventually painted over by the artist

The canvas: my face in the mirror, fifty eight years familiar with this world.

Five or six, roaming like the free-range child I was, I caught the sharp end of a rock that soared from an older brother’s slingshot. He didn’t mean it, don’t think he aimed at me, but the impact was hard, and the flesh below my left eye tore, and years later my mother said,” We probably should have gotten you stitches there.”

It’s faint now, a sleeping crescent moon at the top of my cheek. Grace that it didn’t hit my eye, methinks. Pure grace.

Pentimento.

Seven years old, my neighborhood friend
Chrissy rammed a big branch end into the tender space between my nose and my lips, that little grooved path that caps my cupid’s bow.

I’ve since learned its name is philtrum, and no hard feelings, but the game we were playing tattooed a constellation of broken blood vessels across my upper lip, and dotting towards the tip of my nose.

Pentimento.

At twenty nine I had some of that lasered away. Safe for the pale philtrum, not so for the tender lip herself, and so I carry the permanent memory of that day as some big red blotches across my lip. Lipstick never covers it completely.

Pentimento.

Teenaged and beyond, the blackheads landed on my nose and built whole neighborhoods there, and some pimple friends moved in to join them. An anxious one I was, and I discovered the simultaneous relief and delight of squeezing all those things.

So many years later, I can find a few little craters, and small dark lines that seem to drag one pore into another. Not enough so you’d notice, but my nose reminds me I lived through those times. And survived.

Pentimento.

At forty five the crinkling started. The skin at the outer corners of my eyes led the way.

Vertical lines across my forehead came a little later. Layering and playing with texture and color, nature gently added grooves. There are smile lines, and the little cupped channels below my eyes that trace the outlines of darker circles there.

Pentimento.

Sometime between then and fifty, one side of my mouth shifted downwards. It has the oddest effect, like half of each lip is larger, and the drooping side disappears into itself. Sometimes, I paint on lipliner to even it all out.

Pentimento.

Around fifty I began to notice that the skin was slowing way down. Once pressed and imprinted with pillow or a hand propping chin or cheek, she wasn’t so quick to plump back into her former texture and shape. Sometimes I carry the pillow lines until lunch, and I’m an early riser.

Pentimento.

The eyebrows have thinned. Some come in white, and there is a vacant patch in the thickest part of the right one. Sometimes, I pencil in some dark to seed that bare spot. Often, I don’t. The white hairs? I usually thank them for visiting before plucking them away.

Pentimento.

There are some random dark splotches over the cheeks, above the lip.. They call them age spots, I call them places of interest. I don’t cover these, though I wonder, sometimes, how many more will arrive, and if I’ll care.

Pentimento.

Face as canvas, and the mirror shows me the privilege of a longer life than many are given. On close inspection I find layer upon layer of sad and happy, hurt and scared, content and growing wiser. I find hope and despair, and lots of letting go, and a glaze of peace on top of it all.

May 24, 2019 / 1 Comment

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2 thoughts on “twenty four may”

Alexa says:

October 5, 2018 at 6:34 pm

Your beautiful singing/poetry enriches my life, is part of the amazing tapestry of my life like the Trees and the Sky and the Crows. Such a wonderful blessing at this profound bend of the river in this particular journey of life for me. So appreciative that l appreciate it. A companion that arrives without notice like dappled Light.
Thank You! I have such profound Love for You.

- Melinda says:
  
  October 7, 2018 at 5:17 pm
  
  THank you so much, Alexa. It means the world to know my words matter.

Melinda Coppola

twenty four may | from the inside out

twenty four may

Pentimento

Pentimento

Tender

Hmmm. I thought I put me down right there

Dear Future Roadmaker

Inch by Inch

April is…

Our small eyes

To Sleep, Perchance to Wake and See the Stars

Love is a Rendering

Daisy Bell

There’s no write time

Dreamed some dreams

In praise of song

Receiving the darkness

Morning is mostly a prayer

Arrivals

The Meaning of Compassion

Little Things

The Sings

Natura Illustratio

2 thoughts on “twenty four may”

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