The Barbie Cycle 9

Letter to Ken

There you are in the news again

I don’t want to write another poem about you

I am bored Ken, tired of your games, filled with ennui,

a new face – you certainly needed it but I’m not sure it’s an improvement

a new ‘internet reality show’ – that’s an oxymoron I think? 

your backers want you to compete with Her in the fashion-plate stakes – what?

‘the ultimate boyfriend for every occasion’ 

so you are to be enhanced to resemble

a neck-less, brain-less booby

pumped with iron and steroids  

hairless and toothy (they report nothing of your crutch so I can only guess) 

full of romantic gestures 

you have gone from plastic mannequin to plastic god-freak 

truly a fitting consort to that diva in pink

I think they are lying:  you are not built to celebrate boyfriend-hood

rather the ultimate genie of

The Man

The Barbie Cycle 8

Plastic Love

Let the public vote!  no mind beats in the vacant chest of that malleable coy mistress

Barbie

how can we call it

   love

projected onto those guardians of our childish hearths 

the Lares and Penates of the Pink World?

Love does not bend unless it’s plastic: 

worth unknown but price precise, with discount, tax and shipping

Barbie’s not Time’s fool:  her fuchsia lips and cheeks

blanche only to fashion’s dictate

and alter to match the marketing brief

 – even to the edge of taste and decorum

Ken dallied with the Toys

while Barbie surfed the dating game

now he’s asking us to choose for her  

what hope do our full-sized selves have if elections determine love?

The Barbie Cycle 7

Ken-Ken

Time    stands still                         for style icons.   Take Ken                                     turning 50 this year
	Back in the day                       Ken                         felt             male His                                 lush blond locks
My guess Ken works out             He is wise                    strong melt factor he slips away Gone are the days he doesn’t want to look like a loser Ken is gay                   a handbag                    draws a blank
	Is that why Barbie dropped him?             because Ken started    relaxing            his prostate her pink                       the pink           the pink            the pink Ken has developed a taste

Found poem, after an article in The Age, January 2011

The Barbie Cycle 6

After all that seriousness, I think it is time for some more irreverence.

The Barbie Cycle began about - ooh - twenty years ago and has groan (sic) with me, or perhaps aged is the better verb.

This poem was inspired by a news article that a charity was auctioning a specially commissioned Barbie, which sold for something in the range of $300,000 - I can only hope it was for a good cause.  It is less acerbic than most of the Barbie poems and probably makes most sense when read with the others.

New Jewels for Barbie

your most expensive look your newest incarnation Argyll pink diamonds in a collar of glitter  darling you’re wearing well at 51, with youth fading past we all know the answer is bling!  Stefano’s black frock a face lift                     and diet  are you getting any yet?

Sadly, I don't seem to be able to load any photos today, so imagine if you will, a black frock, a blonde dame, and bling!

The Barbie Cycle 5

The other side of the pink sugar fairy?

Tattoo Barbie

I hear you’ve been pregnant

I hear you had a tat on your tum

body piercings next?

love, washable baby tattoos

hearts and flowers and bambi

Oh no!

Barbie-wire, a dagger

a bleeding rose

a crumbling skull

and your foot on Ken’s face

fifty means freedom girl

The Barbie Cycle 4

When I wrote this poem, I didn’t know about the tattoo, the relationship dramas with darling Ken or even all the details of the 126 (and counting) careers Barbie has applied for with her ‘can do’ attitude.  Except, maybe it is a ‘can be’ attitude which somehow suggests to me more of  acting the role of, rather than rolling up her sleeves and doing the hard slog.   Sells more outfits I suppose.

Once again, apologies to any (any?) reader who may be inadvertently offended by the following lines.  I am aiming to poke fun at the doll and the marketing, not any earnest folk undertaking these roles in er, real life.

Barbie,  Icon of our Dreams

if you were a feminist, in suit and tie

or a plumber in overalls,

would you wear pink?

can a plaything be a feminist person?

all our hate and frustration is

focussed on you, small plastic

fetish

if you can’t have it all –

hairy armpits, purple stubble,

the tattoo,

the lesbian lover

the broken-hearted Ken

and the PhD in gender implications at the Quantum Point

what hope do we have?

the pink Cadillac

If I were cyber-savvy, I would have Bruce Springsteen playing while you read and a nice photo shoot of appropriate cars, but I don’t know the copyright protocols of ‘borrowing’ images or sound clips on the cyber-sea, so can only ask that you imagine these accompaniments.

The Barbie Cycle 3

An antidote to Ovid and exile.

Rant alert!

A few months ago there was much in the news about Barbie.  Parent groups were up in arms about the latest electronically enhanced doll.  Barbie was fitted with a video necklace (where else are these micro cameras fitted?) and a backpack screen.  It did strike me as an odd collision of desires, but then others were saying your finger in the dike of progress will not stop the flood - electronic gadgets are ubiquitous and persistent.  What I want to know is why would you buy a spy-Barbie if you didn't agree with the morals? Why not ban them from your house, like I gather a certain couple does in their M Mansion - no apples allowed inside:  no -tunes, no -phones, no -pods or -anything else. 

Why do people want to stop everyone else?  Why not simply stop themselves? Like petrol prices and the 'greedy oil giants' - nobody makes you buy a car and fill it with 'their' petrol.  Catch a bus, ride your bike, walk.  You don't have to buy the dream they're selling.  Make your own dream, but please don't try to ram it down the throats of everybody else.  Sorry. 

Barbie the Mole?

have you swapped sides, you invidious chameleon? 

now equipped with a video camera

 on your chest – of course 

and play-back screen, cunningly inserted in your

electronic back

if becoming Barbie is what girls dream of,

are we now bionic spies of ourselves?

is Barbie the paedophile’s ideal toy

and how long before we are all wired

and monitored

and down-loadable

chipped           coded              digitised 

the perfect tracking toy

The Barbie Cycle 2

I feel I need to make some confessions before I sacrifice another doll.  I do not own any of these mannequins, and never have.  Perhaps my fascination is rooted in deprivation as a child, when I was forbidden such a "vulgar" toy.  Instead I played with the dolls of my friends and secretly lusted for my own.

I gave my daughter one when she was old enough not to be in danger of choking.  She preferred bears and promptly decapitated poor Barbie, thus ending the experiment.  Someone gave her the accompanying house.  Children are famous for discarding the toy and engaging with the packaging:  my sweetie took a fancy to the detachable lamp post complete with battery and working light.  This implement became her wand, her walking stick, her bear's reading light, her torch, her ultimate defence.

My more recent encounters with the star of the toy world are all mediated through the internet, almost exclusively inspired by news reports in otherwise respectable papers.  I am continuously amazed by her publicity department:  I am sure many of the flesh-and-blood world would give their (bendy, detachable) right arms for her global profile.  Ethically I worry that I may be pandering to this commercial giant, which I think is clear, is never my intention.  Nor is it my intention to infringe her copyright, trademark or damage her in anyway.

Barbie, O Barbie, now we are fifty

they are writing about you in the paper

I get to age in private

poor you

they say you would have back pain

yup, me too

they say you would have osteoporosis

girl, let’s keep the blinkers on and drink more milkshakes

they say you would wear glasses

I’ve worn them for years, very sexy ones

they say you would have grey hair

a girl like you, no problems with the dye

me, I’m relishing every strand of earned silver

they say you might be shorter

darling, I’ve spent my life down here

they say you would have trouble standing up

what with your impressive breasts and waist

they just don’t know do they?

my tits have shrunk and sunk into my waist

fast-growing to support them

but, Barbie

you’re still kicking ass, right?

still in love with lust?

still no fulfilment – the eternal virgin?

poor you

March 2009

The Barbie Cycle 1

Isn't Barbie an amazing phenomenon?  How those plastic idols infiltrate and mimic our lives?

Over the years I've written a few paeans about this little goddess.  Enjoy.

Barbie

we were launched in the same year, you and me:

my legs are not madly elongated: like yours

nor do my breasts proclaim the pyramids

I hope my stare is thoughtful not vapid

and bless me, my hair is more manageable.

I can grasp objects and work

my arms bend too and

I can wear flat shoes

but Barbie O Barbie

how I envy your crutch:

smooth crack- and hair- less

with only the suggestion of a declivity

behind

are you not racked by lust or guilt

eternal virgin

priestess of the impossible fuck?



Revisited in honour of Marilyn for Magpie Tales.  More dolls here

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