The Secret Lives of Shirts by Elizabeth (Buffy) Noble - Winning Poetry entry Write Queer London 2012

Yellow Morphy Richards iron from Geffrye Museum handling collectioncollection

The secret lives of shirts
I am flattened,
And again flattened.
I am forced.
I am heavy as a man,
hanging
I am heavy as a day.
I am made straight.
but
I have been silk, undone, wettened
I have been lovingly dangled
I have been crumpled, left crumpled, worn again
I have been, again and,
I have been snagged, drenched, torn
I have been slid,
look
I am turning yellow, but
I have been red, and brown, and pink
Try to question me.
I am folded.
Ask me a question
I am a line of buttons.

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Contributed by: Elizabeth (Buffy) Noble

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