I wash my face - poem

Ella Newberry

Mary Cassatt, Woman Bathing (La Toilette), 1890/1891

This poem was inspired by "Woman Bathing (La Toilette)" (1890-91), painted by American artist Mary Cassatt, who was heavily influenced by Japanese print in her later work. 

Playing on Cassatt's marriage of Western perspective and Eastern art, I explore the banality of routine as a constant amidst the change, adjustment and existential contemplation I experienced when I moved to Taipei, reflecting on the tangible elements of life that mark our days, even when our lives look entirely different. 

In that sense, Cassatt’s painting unifies us, capturing a figure that emulates us all as we all hang over our sinks, washing our faces in the evening, regardless of what that day held. 

I Wash My Face

Every night I wash my face. 

Some nights I lather on gloopy gels,

And glide over my cheekbones ice cold rollers.

Some nights I leave my micellar water at home, 

And my red eyes sting as I use soap,

To prickle waterline smudges

With suds of warm Thames water. 

Some nights I wipe away tears, 

Oh, I love to cry. 

Sometimes, I look into a mirror,

And realise I’m entirely elsewhere.

How my eyes stung those months. 

The tears that soddened IKEA pillowcases,

Mingle with hot water and street vendor detergent

in the drum of my outdoor washing machine.

I watch it turn round and round,

As I sit on my bed like a cat,

Without a thought of anything broader.

Some nights, I sit on my washing machine when I smoke

One of the 50p Marlboro Golds

I bought at 7/11, 

And I worry it will break, 

And that it wouldn’t feel a thing,

Or it would

and it would be the only thing I couldn’t.

Every night I brush my teeth, 

Some nights my spit is spat red, 

But still I wake up at 11am, 

Which is no longer 3,

And I step outside.

Enveloped in thick air that wraps fat arms around me

In an embrace of its dependent.

I have the stick lit in my mouth,

那么丑的味道！

I set off speed walking,

Until I’m jolting around

A little pink bus,

Tumbling through the mountains.

Mountains that eventually,

I tumble back down, 

To wash my face of motorbike fuel and sweat,

And I go to sleep, in a room that I know exists

But is nowhere I can quite grasp hold of.