Thursday, June 28, 2012

24TH STREET, OMAHA, CIRCA 2012


DREAM HOUSE



   Dream House
Barbara
   Millicent
      Roberts
has not a leg to stand on, so
   there she lies,
at yet another curb of
her oh so concrete life with
face down to the gutter.
And there in a box by her side,
you will find
a swim suit,
  a ball gown,
     a wedding dress.

And some would like to think
that this was all a woman
   would ever need,
and of course there might be
   some    truth in that.
But then again,
such an assumption
could be part of    the problem.

It was shortly after
she hooked up with Ken
that the fateful accident occurred.
As a couple, she and Ken
were once seen by many
as the ultimate of romance;
the pinnacle   of amour.
At least by      girls anyway.

Odd then that she
never took Ken's
last name of   Carson.
Oh, not that she didn't want to get married,
for indeed it seemed that she and Ken
were perpetually on the verge
  of wedding bliss.
So why not take the man’s name?
I mean, it wasn't like many
knew of her as Barbara Millicent Roberts.
No, in those uber-chic days
of glamour and haute couture,
one's nom de plume was best kept
at its most basic guttural utterance.
Cher, Bono, Madonna...
I guess you know
you have arrived
when the world knows you
by your trademark self-simple-syllabic
  Fabio fabrication.

Ah, fame.
The limelight.
That freeze frame turn
at the end of the catwalk,
with a barrage of searing strobes
irradiating your skin.
Lock that pose,
vogue a la mode,
   and then
with a twist of the hip,
   it's gone.
      All gone.
Without   a leg   to stand on.

The way the little girl tells it,
Barbie lost her leg in a
drunk driving accident.
An intoxicated Ken
there at the wheel of Barbie's car,
plowing into some bridge abutment 
   and there sending
a once perfect paradigm 
through the windshield.
At least that's one version of the story.

The little girl's
older brother   tells another.
That in a drunken stupor,
Barbie once spent the night on the lawn,
only to wake to the brutal fact that
the family dog had
chewed off one of her legs.

Well, okay.
One extreme trauma,
relative     to another.
Misfortune.
Misadventure.
Mistaken.
Mislaid plans.

That Ken's face
was marred from that accident,
   or alternatively,
given a malicious full-face tattoo
by a certain malcontent brother
with a felt tip pen...

I mean, was it really any wonder
that Ken had taken to drinking so heavily?
And let's face it.
No matter how much he drank,
he was never going to be
a     man's man.
His parent company "Mattel"
had pretty much seen to that.
Emasculation humiliation
at his very moment of creation.
Anatomically incorrect,
he loses that precious pair of cajones
he never had in the first place.

And he loses his job.
And he finds an unforgiving bridge pylon.
And she loses her leg.
And she will not    walk again.
And she will not    ever forgive.
And the two of them
   fabricate stories
in a vain effort
to survive each other—
to at least survive
the end of their dream.

Yes well, Barbie did have her dream house,
and I suppose if there was any
concrete consistency
to cling to in this
"Made by Mattel" existence,
it would be that Barbie would
   always
have her dream house.
Food, clothing and... shelter.
Pink plastic    and pastel perfection.
A paragon parcel of paradise
purveyed and pooped forth
for her pleasured perusal.
Your pleasured perusal. 

Yes,
its everything you ever wanted.
Her dream house.
Your dream house.
Our dream house.

Everything you ever wanted.
And of course there’s no doubt
that we can afford it.
That is, right up until that
moment we actually can't.
And a home
   becomes a house
       becomes
a vacant cavity.

And things left behind
   end up at the curb.

A plastic doll with a missing leg.

Another with blackened face.

Someone's precious dream house
as seen through the tears
of a little girl
as she gazes back
through a
fractured
   rearview
      mirror.

Ó2012 Jack Hubbell