Dress
by Julie R. Enszer
It is not the dress we want, but the life we will live in that dress
—Diana Vreeland
I confess, I am buying
Eileen Fisher dresses
on eBay without abandon.
Black. Blue. Brown. Charcoal grey.
I wear them with brightly-colored
tights. They are long, drape
below my knees, one nearly
to my ankles. I wear them
with scarves and boots,
brown leather boots and
bulky wool sweaters, my hair
tied back in a bun, a few
wisps around my neck.
It is not the dresses I want,
though I need them to teach;
I want the life I imagine
living in these dresses.
A life I imagined when
I began college, when we walked
at dusk the tree-lined streets
of Ann Arbor after milkshakes,
looking at the large houses
of professors, when we read
poems aloud late into the night,
when I saw in your eyes
for the first time what it was
to be loved. I need these dresses;
I want that life.
Julie R. Enszer, PhD, is a scholar and a poet. She is the author of Sisterhood (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2013) and Handmade Love (A Midsummer Night’s Press, 2010). She is editor of Milk & Honey: A Celebration of Jewish Lesbian Poetry (A Midsummer Night’s Press, 2011). Milk & Honey was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award in Lesbian Poetry. She has her MFA and PhD from the University of Maryland. She is the editor of Sinister Wisdom, a multicultural lesbian literary and art journal, and a regular book reviewer for the Lambda Book Report and Calyx. You can read more of her work at www.JulieREnszer.com.