12 January 2010

I'm whole.

I love Alix Olson's "Eve's Mouth"

Eve’s mouth hurts from trying not to laugh
at some joke some scholar made
about her being someone’s half.
It was a joke, a lie, exaggeration, a fib.
And now you all believe I came from his rib.

She screams at the top of her lungs:
"I’m whole! I’m body, I’m heart, I’m mind, I’m soul."

Well, Queen Victoria gave her daughter some advice
as her daughter shook and trembled on her wedding night.
Queen Victoria, she said to her daughter:
"Baby, lie still and think of the Empire!"
And her husband, though kind and mild,
he never stopped to wonder why she never smiled.

Little Red Riding Hood was walking down the trail,
she was carrying the goodies,
thought "They’ll go stale".
So, she ate ‘em all up and that was that.
Then, she threw them all up, fear of getting fat.
Cause even Red Riding Hood reads magazines,
the ones prescribing diets for pre-teens.

Now, we’ve got Cinderella, she’s chilling at home
quite content with being alone.
She is playing with the mice and singing with the birds
and they’re the only ones who ever heard these words.
She said "I’ll get in the damn pumpkin. Do it all right,
weep and lose my slipper, freak out at midnight.
But there’s one thing that the prince might not like,
it’s the Fairygodess I’m after.
I’m a dyke."

She screams at the top of her lungs "I’m whole,
I’m body, I’m heart, I’m mind, I’m soul"
She screams at the top of her lungs "I’m whole,
I’m body, I’m heart, I’m mind, I’m soul."

So we’ve got Snow White, she’s a homemaker of sorts cause she cleans and she cooks and she takes care of dwarves. One day, I said "SnowWhite, go back to school".
She said "No, I can’t, I’d feel like a fool. You know, it’s hard for us womyn to try to be ourselves,
we spend our whole damn lives taking care of little elves.

Now we’ve got Rapunzel, she’s chilling in the tower, waiting for the handsome prince
she’s sapped of all her power.
Finally, one day, the handsome prince in town
called up to Rapunzel, "Yo girl, let it down!"
But our dear Rapunzel was nowhere to be seen,
yes our dear Rapunzel had learned something keen.
"All that time alone kinda taught me how to cope,
so I shaved my head and I made me a rope!"

Now, Helen of Troy, they say, launched a thousand ships
with the short of her skirt and the shape of her lips.
And when that old bard lay the blame at her face
for the rape of a nation-
Wrong time. Wrong place.
Helen simply whispered, "history’s our test.
Look between the lines, girls, Read beneath the text."

She screams at the top of her lungs, "I’m whole,
I’m body, I’m heart, I’m mind, I’m soul"
She screams at the top of her lungs, "I’m whole,
I’m body, I’m heart, I’m mind, I’m soul"
She screams.

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