What Do Women Want?
by: Kim Addonizia
I want a red dress.
I want it flimsy and cheap,
I want it too tight, I want to wear it
until someone tears it off me.
I want it sleeveless and backless,
this dress, so no one has to guess
what’s underneath. I want to walk down
the street past Thrifty’s and the hardware store
with all those keys glittering in the window,
past Mr. and Mrs. Wong selling day-old
donuts in their café, past the Guerra brothers
slinging pigs from the truck and onto the dolly,
hoisting the slick snouts over their shoulders.
I want to walk like I’m the only
woman on earth and I can have my pick.
I want that red dress bad.
I want it to confirm your worst fears about me,
to show you how little I care about you
or anything except what
I want. When I find it, I’ll pull that garment
from its hanger like I’m choosing a body
to carry me in this world, through
the birth-cries and the love-cries too,
and I’ll wear it like bones, like skin,
it’ll be the goddamned
dress they bury me in.
Me wearing the Carla dress by Bettie Page,
in red ofcourse....
*cough* *blush*
ReplyDeleteUhm, yeah, that was... Interesting :9
And pretty damn well written as well!
Hi, new reader here...
ReplyDeleteI have to say that your Hellbunny dress would work for this poem! Lovely.
Hello Athena,
ReplyDeleteWelcome!
That was the dress I was thinking of!;)