Fat Women

Fat Women never walk across the sand
without leaving footprints.
Fat Women never slip away unseen.
Fat Women get noticed.
Fat Women leave their mark.

Fat Women never run without moving
as some women run without moving
with bodies held as firmly immobile
as cardboard paper dolls once promised.

At one time, Fat Women might have been sorry
to realize the best clothes were reserved
for women built like paper dolls.
Tabs folding behind their hard, flat
arms and waists, belting them in.

At one time, Thin Women might have been sorry
to see Fat Women moving
to see how the sea moves under their skin
unhushed waves of dancing
(thigh, butt, hip, belly, breast and chin)

as if jitterbugging to internal rhythms
as if laughing at a joke others didn't get
as if remembering a round and perfect world
(hills, dunes and uneven flowing ground).

Imagine the sadness of cardboard women
whose bodies are held too still
to jitterbug or laugh or remember.
Imagine the sadness looks like anger.
Imagine the sadness looks like fear.
Imagine what they have shaved off
(figures, food, years, life and self)
to fit into the paper dresses
that Fat Women will never fit in.