Barbie Doll

Marge Piercy

This girlchild was born as usual

and presented dolls that did pee-pee
and miniature GE stoves and irons
and wee lipsticks the color of cherry candy.
Then in the magic of puberty, a classmate said:
You have a great big nose and fat legs.

She was healthy, tested intelligent,

possessed strong arms and back,
abundant sexual drive and manual dexterity.
She went to and fro apologizing.
Everyone saw a fat nose on thick legs.

She was advised to play coy,

exhorted to come on hearty,
exercise, diet, smile and wheedle.
Her good nature wore out
like a fan belt.
So she cut off her nose and her legs
and offered them up.

In the casket displayed on satin she lay

with the undertaker's cosmetics painted on,
a turned-up putty nose,
dressed in a pink and white nightie.
Doesn't she look pretty? everyone said.
Consummation at last.
 KEN Can’t you see that she lived her life in vain?
Erick Marco G. Ramos (30)
How about me? Are you too stupid to see?
This boy child was born as usual, Shall I cut myself too? Shall I bring the
Playing with GI Joe’s and faux iron pistols knife to me?
With pots of paint and mounds of mud
The kinds of things, boys do for fun He stepped away from the casket, composed
but contrite.
Then in the magic of puberty, a classmate A torrent of tangled thoughts, ensuing
said; (5) inside.
You’re too small, you’re too BIG, you’re He was envious, he was enraged. (35)
too this, you’re too that For what he wanted was not so easy to
You’re too much but still not enough. change.
You’re not like us, you’re not either but But is it really…?
neither… She did IT!
Not this, not that, not anything at all! Why can’t he?
Therefore you are nothing, therefore you are But even if he did… (40)
OTHER! (10) Will he finally be?
Will they finally see?
He was witty, tested intelligent
For music and art, possessed tremendous
talent
He had the strength but not for sports
He had the skills outside the courts.
Though he knew, he never shared. (15)
To all, he’s the kid who never dared.
Never spoke, never smiled.
NEVER even breathed a sigh.

 Then in the funeral of a fallen friend,

Whose mangled limbs are beyond amend.
(20)
He heard them say how pretty she is,
But he knows his Barbie is in bro-ken bliss.
Her putty nose, her pink nightie,
Soundless rebellion of her silent reverie

He knows what she knows. He feels what

she feels. (25)
When she breathed, He knew how she
grieved.
Now this grief is eating him too.
He shared with her things they never knew

In the silence of his mind, he screamed his

pain.