First Lady.

The cameras adore her silhouette,
pearls catching flashbulbs like fish in a net.
Every step is choreography,
heels striking marble, history in syncopation.

But in the crowd there is a murmur,
a rumor puffed up like carnival balloons:
“Look closer, she is not what she seems.”
As if mystery were scandal,
as if grace required receipts.

How eager we are to unmask,
to trade gowns for whispers,
to measure bone against bone
as though truth were a tailor’s stitch.

The joke, of course,
is that no disguise hides the hunger of eyes,
the need to invent,
to see shadows where light already shines.

First Lady, last lady,
every lady is part costume,
part confession.
The suit of expectation is heavier than silk.
And whether the world calls her
Madame, Mrs., or Myth,
she wears it all,
smiling at the carnival mirrors
that insist on bending her shape.

What lies beneath?
A human heartbeat,
steady as a drum behind the curtain,
reminding us
the performance belongs as much to the watchers
as to the watched.