Red rubies

Pierce my skin

Sprinkle my pale cheeks,

Happy to have a home where they can shine,

Uninterrupted, for months.

They start as One tiny jewel,

Two grow into a small bejeweled path,

Three dust my neck and back,

Expanding in their comfortable abode.

Red rubies flip a switch,

Turning my face into a Christmas tree.

They amass to form one

Oily ornament, which adorns my nose, my chin.

Grease accumulates within hormonal skin,

Embedding itself into eleven-years-young porcelain.

My hand is drawn to multiplying rubies.

Fingers trace over the bumps,

Wondering how they got there.

My dad tells me, “it’s just puberty, don’t pop them, or you’ll end up like me,”

Like a face with a million holes that have never healed,

That haven’t forgotten a rupture in their very being,

And I leave them alone, the precious gems that decorate my face.

But at least, 

I am surrounded by kids

Whose faces have genetically succumbed to rubies,

To invasive gems that have spread to the tween population like broken shards of porcelain,

Uneven, some bigger than others.

Our faces break,

Together.

Scarlett eczema over the rest of my body

Forces the rubies into a pale comparison.

An unbearable itch shackles my elbows, knees, and back like brick work.

The pressure mottles my porcelain skin into cracked ground,

Until it shatters in rivulets of red.

Wide eyes stare at my legs,

Pointing at dried blood.

Kids around me lock their gaze on the crooks of infested elbows. 

The rest of my skin breaks,

In solitude. 

My family and I rush to the doctor, 

Desperate for the key to release the judgmental stares,

Separating brick from porcelain. 

But all she tells us is, “look at the round patches, it’s ringworm!”

It’s just a skin infection, and it can be cured with a pill,

“Only time will tell!”

Pills do nothing and time does less.

My mom takes it upon herself to glue my segmented skin back together

With the help of the internet, she reads textbooks about what causes inflammation,

Forcing me on a dairy, gluten free diet.

She researches what calms inflammation,

Coating me with aloe vera.

Scarlett slowly fades, brick by brick.

The diet stays for a little bit longer, 

Until I get tired of seeing friends eat strawberry shortcake ice cream pops,

Until I feel like a freak for missing out on pizza parties,

Until I munch on what is forbidden, and my skin doesn’t break.

Realizing that I just needed a detox, my mom opens up the wonderful, scary world of glutinous food again.

And now I am only left with

Red rubies on my face,

Same as they always have been.

In seven years,

I haven’t popped them, I’ve learned to paint them

Into perfectly white, but textured, porcelain

Because I don’t want to awaken

Parasitic gems that will otherwise take offense to an ungrateful host.

I am left with

Smooth skin everywhere else on my body. 

Red cracks have healed into polished talc, 

Soft and milky white.

Every now and then, 

The talc disintegrates into powder,

Revealing a rash that dots my fingers, my wrists 

A constant reminder that my skin is no longer porcelain,

But a weak stone that will fracture under too much weight.