"When Barbie Turns Sixty" [by Jane Shore]

When Barbie Turns Sixty

Maybe she’ll join Jews for Jesus.
Or try Buddhism. She’ll downsize,
sell her Dreamhouse and pink Corvette,
toss out the boxed, closet-cluttering
cremains of her beloved pets
to make room for an elliptical.
She’ll diet. But first she must learn
how to open her mouth. She’s hoping
to finally get a vagina, even if it’s only
painted on, like her forty-first birthday
surprise when she woke up with a belly
button that wasn’t there the night before.
As the big Six-O approaches,
she’ll have the time to read a book
that is not one of her accessories.
She doesn’t want you to think she’s
just a chunk of plastic with no brain.
She’s not quite old enough to retire.
It seems like only yesterday she burned
her bra. Luckily, she saved her hippie
maxi-dress and taupe boho fringe bag
to sell someday on eBay. The horror!
The horror! if her clothes don’t fit.
With zaftig Curvy Barbie on the market,
and her Fashionista sisters, Tall and Petite,
garbed in eleven different shades of skin,
who will want the original blue-eyed
bombshell with the bubble hairdo,
pointy boobs, and stiletto-ready feet,
a freak with impossible proportions?
She’s heard the rumors about Barbies
being mutilated and shorn, decapitated,
thrown into blenders and microwaves;
and models that were recalled, epic fails
like Oreo-Fun Barbie and Teen Talk Barbie
who said she couldn’t handle math.
You can’t call a senior citizen a bimbo.
Looking ahead to her seventh decade,
a facelift might rekindle her on-again
off-again romantic relationship with
Ken or, if he’s unavailable, Blaine,
or that new dude with the man-bun.
After her diamond anniversary gala,
she’ll work on recovering the demure
sideways glance of her youth. She’s a survivor.
She’d like you to call her Barbara.

-- Jane Shore. First published in Salmagundi

Comments

[Mona Houghton]

Great! Perfect for the moment...for the last 40 years.

[Terence Winch]

Terrific poem!