First- silk slippers,
Scorched the carmine hue of flames,
the depth of ashes
color of papery inked decrees
from an Emperor
not their own.

Breathless, gurgling cries.
Perfumed silhouettes scurrying under waxing moonlight
“A girl, not boy”,
a disgrace
sweetmeat tongues slander.
Whitewashed, unnamed, unforgiven
Merciful.
Just another concubine.

Second- bound feet shoes
like embroidered butterflies that you could
crush in your palm
in the dynasty of
reigning warlords.

Putrid lotuses soaked in floral blood
To erase ignominy of birth.
Bound, unbound, bound again,
Molded in golden form
that mobilized her crippled soul
into adequacy.

Third- lace-up boots,
awash with rationed bleach and dirt
by the warm candlelight
like shattering bombs of the
men at war with themselves.

Under an opera stage,
her home,
a bony girl squatted by the dim stage-lights
cradling the smell of words.
But her father
drew it and placed it into her brother’s
smooth white hands
leaving her coarse red ones
empty.

Fourth- glitter heels
plastic, clear as glass
that is invisibly visibly
stopping her
sitting in a boardroom with
males.

In the mirror
on a wall,
accessorized in her degrees
a girl paints her lips
the carmine hue of ambition,
hoping that she is beautiful enough,
to atone
for her
unatonable sin.