At My Most Beautiful (2014)

Hair, glass, 2 1/2" x 1 1/2"

My husband went grey very quickly during a stressful period, as presidents sometimes do in their first term. He grew self conscious and started referring to them, only half jokingly, as beige hairs. I kissed his temples, the beige epicenter, my lips always finding a home in the soft indentation that smelled of him. He was growing older, as I hoped he would continue to do for many more decades in my company, and what a blessing it is to watch time moving across your favorite person on earth.

This piece contains every grey hair that grew on my husband’s head during the last year of our marriage. It was conceived as an act of devotion: I will take what you dislike about yourself, I will separate it out from everything else, I will give it my loving attention, I will hold it up to the light.

At my most beautiful
I count your eyelashes secretly.
with every one, whisper I love you.
I let you sleep.
I know your closed eye watching me,
listening.
I thought I saw a smile.
—R.E.M.