When You Smile, I Look at Your Eyes

Liahm Blank / CREATIVE NON-FICTION

We lament that which we can see no longer. That is: the chin and its point, the lips and their red, the nostrils and their round (yes, even the nostrils), cloaked behind masks, and masks, and masks. Blushing cheeks hide behind the overwhelmed filters—pink dulled by the black respirator. 

Faces are nothing but walls now, covered by cloth to disappoint those who wish to have a conversation. Do not stand too close. Do not enunciate enough that your mask slips below your nose. How many times can I repeat "What?" before it becomes awkward? 

Thus is life when the air is poison. I do not recognize my closest friends; I have not hugged anyone in a whole year. I view life behind foggy glasses, listen with sore ears, and breathe with a dented nose. Dimples have disappeared, and teeth chatter from the cold but nobody notices. And I cannot smile. And I cannot smile. Nobody can see lips form a curve, or teeth that jut out ever so slightly when they are released from the mouth. The only indication of happiness is the squinting 

eyes. A slight crinkle of the laugh lines, the bottom eyelashes touching the top. And that is it. Gone too soon, gone before we can appreciate that this is the new smile, the new way to show that we are happy. 

I am eating a sandwich on sanitized seats, mask dangling limply from my left ear. Mrs. L sees my bare face for the first time in months, and she says, "There is something different about you." 

"What do you mean?" I ask. 

"You just have changed so much… You look older, or something."

But that's just it: faces are not what they used to be. They morph, and change, and seem to shapeshift under the radar. And we cannot appreciate the beauty of growing up. The baby fat has melted away; the cheekbones and jawlines are more defined now. Eyes, slightly sunken, are solid. He grew a little stubble for the first time; she got her braces off. These are the hidden changes—undetectable to those who want to appreciate their beauty. A masked child is a blossoming rose in a garbage bag, where petals will bloom and fall uncelebrated. 

Masks truly are the best magicians; they make us feel as though we've disappeared, as though what we have to say is not worth the effort of being spoken through a filter. We are breathless in the fight to keep our identities when the mask conceals so well. Breathless as we hold on to what we need to say; breathless as we cancel and forget and postpone to a later date. And there is no sigh of relief; there are no words that may slip through the grasp of the mask. 

The world is muffled now. Singers slur their songs, their proud voices caught by the weave of a mask. Lovers kiss through zipped lips, quarrel through the quiet cloth. We do not blow candles out over birthday cakes—not that we are together for birthdays, or funerals, or any event in between. Living in the moment has been postponed to the future, and the future, and the future: living has been postponed until the mask is just an artifact. 

Yet when the maskless walk into a room, I try to disappear. I shrivel behind my cloth shield and try to dissipate into every small particle in the air. There is no greater surprise than the naked nose, or mouth with its spitting capabilities. There exists no man more arrogant than he who refuses to wear his mask, and yet I still miss what is hidden. Masks are necessary, but they are sad. They sag on the students' tired faces, cut into the cheeks of healthcare workers, suffocate the asthmatics. Am I a hypocrite for enjoying protection while longing for a time without the protector?

I have moped, and I have groaned, and I have most recently written about my longing for life without masks (see above). But I have realized that we cannot live our lives tied down by the straps of an N95. We cannot stop living while we wait for our friends to stop dying. We must recognize that there is more to us than the pieces we cannot see. Forget the chin, forget the lips; forget the teeth, forget the nostrils. 

Let this piece be an ode to the expressiveness of eyes instead. Though we cannot see your smile, we can still understand. So smile, and smile, and smile, and I will know to look for the squint of your eyes or the flutter of your eyelashes every time. Let my words be a testament to the many ways eyebrows can signify confusion, or anger, and the way a forehead can crinkle in frustration. This piece is for eyelashes, and the upper part of the nose, and the part of the ear that is not suffocated by the claws of the mask. Let this piece be a tribute to existing in spite of being hidden; in fact, let us exist because we are hidden. 

This piece is for the girls who put on lipstick even though nobody will see their lips. It is for the pretty-eyed boys who have only now received their dues. It is for the thankful faces with the ugly noses, and the men who skip their daily shave. It is for the dedicated dentists who are crafting something nobody will see. It is for the six-year-old at the supermarket who wore a mask too large for him, and it is for the mask that covered his entire face. My words are for anyone whose face I cannot see. 

Let this piece stand as a testament to our love for everything we can still see. Let's rejoice in the fact that the mask cannot take our identity away, just make us more difficult to identify. Let’s wear our masks proudly though we long for the ability to see the lower half of the face. Please, think about me every time you pull up your mask. 

And when you smile, I will look at your eyes.