Tag Archives: July 28

Jackie O No

I was an elegant baby, born three
short months before the crash, but never did
I beg or want, or keep my horses from
their oats, or sell their gleaming coats for cash.

I was an elegant toddler, but cried
when the Bonus Army was dispelled. They
fled from Hoover as he sucked away their
last hopes and sent them back to the Dust Bowl.

I was an elegant child, sure, but at
13, 227 forced the Russians
to fire on their own, and I couldn’t
have been a red blocking patrol, oh no.

I was an elegant teen girl, so my
step-siblings and I were mortified by
the bombs dropping on Germany, but that
was war, unlike the Empire State crash.

I was an elegant lady, with my
blood-stained pink Chanel suit and its matching
pink pillbox hat. That was the year of my
last good birthday, or maybe my only.

I was an elegant woman, and though
I was widowed not once, but twice, and the
earthquakes and the mudslides tossed up dirt passed
my knees, I died that way, too, elegant.

I was an elegant figure, icon
and royalty to a country that had
none of their own, editor in life and
in love, cursed by a name of my choosing.