Denise
Duhamel
DIFFERENTLY-ABLED
BARBIES
In Chicago, a Barbie
loses
her arm. Only the
boy next door knows
he has taken it
to
use as a toothpick.
A little girl
refuses to throw that
Barbie away
and knots her doll's
right sleeve
that hangs limp like
a sail on a breeze-less day.
Another Barbie in Seattle
has a run-in
with a German Shepherd
who leaves her face
as scarred
as
Marla Hanson's.
It would be easy
for a child to cry for
another doll,
but this little girl
suffers
from bouts of eczema
on her forehead.
She knows Barbie is
still the same underneath.
In Baton Rouge, Barbie's
hand melts into a finger-less fist,
a nob, when someone
leaves her on top of a stove.
In Missoula, Montana,
a baby sister cuts off most of Barbie's hair
not realizing it won't
grow back.
Creative mothers invent
slings and casts, flattering hats.
Our impulse to destroy
what is whole,
to coddle and love what
we have injured
Differently-Abled
Barbies appeared
in The Chicago
Review and KINKY
(Orchises Press,
1997).
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