A Barbie Doll's Life Poem by Kim Thomas

If I could, would I opt for a Barbie doll’s life,
and be Ken’s perennially pert trophy wife
with more dresses and coats than I ever could use,
each outfit replete with its own pair of shoes?
With no wrinkles, no stretch marks, my hair never gray,
I’d have nothing to do but look pretty all day.

But if you got tired of my once charming pout,
and my left arm fell off, or my hair all came out,
no matter that you were the one who had caused it,
it’s I who’d get buried somewhere in the closet,
‘til you sold me through eBay on one of your whims,
and bought a new doll with more flexible limbs.

She’d get all my shoes, and the speedy blue roadster,
the Dream House, the dog and the little pink toaster.
I’d do well to escape in the state I’d been tossed,
some duct tape to hold on the parts that I’d lost.
‘Though prospects for used Barbie dolls aren’t fantastic,
maybe I’d care less, if my heart were plastic.