Tuesday, September 2, 2014

Jeans for Poetry Jam



I owned my first pair at 27.
Before that, I wore polyester, 
trying  to be a perfect wife and mother of three
before I had even learned how to be Me.

Then I divorced, walking that fall day 
through the leaves in the West End,
realizing my life was finally my own.

Bought my first jeans,
wandering Gastown in the '70's
in my buckskin jacket with fringe 
to the strains of Elton John,
read Desiderata, took a lover,
had my first orgasm,
watched Jonathan Livingston Seagull and Siddhartha,
burst out of my cage,
life exploding in all directions.

I am still feeling the reverberations,
all these centuries later,
and remembering the look and the feel
of my first pair of jeans.

for Laurie's prompt at Poetry Jam : jeans in 20 lines or less. 

22 comments:

  1. Interesting how we didn't take the time to know ourselves before taking on those roles of wives and mothers. But what a cool time it was to burst out of your cage! I shared some of your same path, Sherry...

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  2. Jeans = "freedom to be me"! How wonderful. A lovely write, Sherry.

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  3. The sound of Elton John and the power of that 70's new life. I remember that freedom buying my own first jeans bought, Lee Cooper's. I love the way you makes this so liberating and alive.

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  4. It looks like you had a lot of "firsts" after your divorce. You made your own path too. So, though I'm sure it wasn't easy, it had to be.

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  5. dang...a new pair of jeans and you get your first orgasm...where did you buy those? smiles...ha...i find comfort in them...and you found a life....

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    1. Oh, Brian, you just made me burst out laughing! Great comment!

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  6. Remembering the jeans as a symbolic ticket to freedom is interesting..if the reverberations are still happening from the break out, it must have been some powerful polyester prison !

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  7. It gives freedom a second chance! It opens up the world of discoveries certainly! Fun write Sherry!

    Hank

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  8. "life exploding in all direction"...that energy associated with first pair of jeans is felt here...a different and new experience to move forward...nice lines Sherry...

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  9. Sounds like liberation came after the marriage, Sherry. Good thing you didn't know what you were missing.

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  10. Ha. Many can relate to this. On the jeans end, I come and go with them, but had not worn for some time and then my children took me to get some--they are useful, but I still have a few favorite patagonia pants I've had for about ten years that can be worn endlessly. (Though now torn! Agh.) A lovely poem. k.

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  11. Ha, I can remember that polyester! Glad you left behind things that weren't you and found yourself. Life is too short to live in a cage!

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  12. Sherry, this was great. Those years were incredible.

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  13. Oh! A poem worthy of Marge Piercy whose first novels documented this new found freedom and firrst orgasms. Birth control, beginning to be available in 1969 helped with the freedom too. I teared up as I read this poem, remembering the first times I was brave enough to step out of the expected patterns. There was a book, I remember--I think it was called "The Greening of America" that rhapsodized on the freedom found in the flapping edges ofthe bell-bottom jeans. We had tio read it as teachers-in-training, to understand adolescents in the 1970s.

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  14. luv jeans, been wearing them since my teen years and still wearing them; have a nice Wednesday

    much love...

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  15. So glad you learned how to be you, Sherry. This is a great poem where personal story meets western history and women's lib.

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  16. Good to see you again Sherry. I always enjoy your poems. So much story in this one--so much in the memory of buying a first pair of jeans.

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  17. A lovely recounting, indeed. You rebel, you. I love this, and your spirit.

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  18. Your jeans have a story to tell ...as does your spirit..

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  19. Yes I think I could almost step into that story. 1975 a divorce and to go back onto a college classes for masters work all I had to do was buy jeans to fit right in...well there were those attitude changes too in the 70s

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  20. Reminds me of "I'll have what she's having" (wearing) ~~ I can relate to so many of these lines.

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