Your lips are intriguing, a sheath for your teeth,
a curled pearl snarl or wrap around rocks,
singing a song or intoning a poem,
bent up in symbols known only to you.
Cheeks rising with lips and eclipsing the eyes,
similar shapes shared in joy and dismay,
skull sockets packed with radial muscles,
and dark skin draped eyelids to hold in the ball.
Brows beetling and bristling make facial creases,
rising in surprise and bowing with frowns,
indicating which way your day is now going,
an arrow pointing up or one pointing down.
Your nose in repose stays smooth as breath flows,
sides flare with your temper, your bridge draws together,
in anger and sadness, over troubled waters,
sorrows salty like seas and easier to drown in.
Lines define the edge of the mouth,
up to the nose, lips out like a bell,
then around down the sides and under the chin
sometimes invisible, but seen when you yell.
Skeletons and paintings can't choose when to smile,
but you do,
these lines can't choose to lie,
but you can.
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