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Alla Through the Looking Glass
To please her
I comb my hair
put on my earrings
and lipstick
Still in my pajamas
I show my face
Like an actress
she says, delighted
Tell me about how you lived
during the famine
—in my mind, a question
I do not ask
She says
that the wild strawberries are in season
that she splurged on a pair of
secondhand slippers
that my cousin—the prettiest girl
in town—can’t get a date
Men her age are all married
or else they went to war
Lips like a pair of crayons
bound by rubber bands
I look at myself
an old woman
Lips like a pink sea mollusk
doing a wedding dance
She looks at herself
a young woman
Double this, double that, momentum transfer
from her palms to mine
on FaceTime
a salute to chance
the resilience of genes
the disquieting miracle of survival 
Alla Through the Looking Glass
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