After all of this stuff feat. Barbies, I figured I would toss out some poems by my friend Ellie Schoenfeld. She is a native of Duluth, MN. and still resides there, doing social work, reading her poetry with music, and being an adult. One thing that made Ellie better-known was her Barbie poems.
One day about 20 years ago I was sitting around UMD with some friends and one friend had brought snacks – little bar cookies. They were very tasty and when I asked her what they were called, she said “Sesame Dream Bars.” That cracked me up because it sounded so much like a Barbie accessory but not really Barbie, maybe some alternative-minded, vegetarian relative about whom we’d never heard. I thought maybe her name would be Aurora. “Barbie’s Little Sister” was the first Barbie poem I wrote. I think I wrote the rest over the next year or two. I haven’t written a Barbie poem in about 15 years, I can’t remember exactly .
So, so Ellie poems that should be better known than they are:
Barbie's Little Sister
Barbie's little sister,
Aurora
got sent away to reform school
when she was thirteen.
Mattel brought her back complete
with wheat germ, a VW love bus
and a recipe for sesame dream bars.
But she never caught on.
Didn't go for the vanity
table or the bubble head.
Thought Barbie was repressed
and Ken was a nerd
so she hit the road
with his cousin.
They went to demonstrations
wore love beads
and got matching tattoos.
Finally, Mattel stopped marketing her.
Didn't think she's make
a good role model.
Winona
Winona is Barbie's walleye warrior friend,
comes complete with a boat
and spearfishing equipment.
Mattel was proud of their attention
to ethnic diversity and affirmative action,
pretty pleased until they realized
she had planned to fish on ceded territory,
had a copy of an old treaty
that said she could.
Free-thinking and liberal
until they noticed Barbie organizing
a witness program and offering convertibles
to anyone with a transportation problem
for free.
Mattel tried to get Winona
to abrogate by offering
bendable elbows and a boyfriend
but she said 'no, thank you'
and Barbie watched
as they tried to pull Winona off the shelves.
Barbie Disappeared One Day
There was a lot of speculation
kidnap, foul-play
maybe a Jimmy Hoffa kind of thing.
The National Enquirer once linked them
in the expose
"Where dolls and mobsters meet."
Actually, she just got sick
of the fame thing
and joined her real-life lover
Elvis
who had been hiding out in Michigan
but had to move
once the tabloids found him.
Moved to Chicago
which is where Barbie found him
working as a roadie
for some of the local bands
and shooting everything
he could melt down.
Eventually the needle found its way
to Barbie and the little known vein
that ran up her plastic arm.
And that's how they lived and loved
on the lower east side,
until they got busted
in a small-time liquor store hold-up.
Elvis escaped.
Barbie got sent downtown
where she confounded the authorities
by having no fingerprints,
aggravated the telephone operator
by insisting
that Midge and Skipper
didn't have any last names.
Barbie Grows Armpit Hair
It was first noted
in the 7th aisle
of the Cash Is Ours store
by Madelaine who was playing
with the demo model
and asked her mother
why Barbie had a moustache
under her arms.
The ensuing shriek
brought all three managers-on-duty
and an off-duty medic
It all started with Belinda
who worked the night shift
in the Barbie and Friends
quality control section
of the factory.
She had worked there for years
checking countless heads
for misstamped eyes, crooked lips,
bad hair.
It was also her job
to administer a short verbal quiz
to make sure the Barbie
had right political beliefs
and Mattel family values.
All the subversives and the socialists
were sent back.
Until one day
Belinda had been passed over
for yet another promotion
and the forman asked her
to shorten her breaks
and smile more often.
In her irritated, distrated state
she let one of the feminist Barbies
keep talking and suddenly something
clicked.
Naturally it was only a matter of time
before she let through Body Hair Barbie
and Menstrual Midge,
complete with a tiny pad,
tampon, sea sponge, and ibuprofen accessories.
There was Softball Skipper
Bi-Barbie and Drag Queen Ken.
Some little boys
and some little girls
found their horizons broadened
their lives irrevocably changed
before Belinda got fired.