Because you do not love us
as we want to love ourselves.

Because of the scarlet letters
you embroider on our chests
as we sleep on yours.

Because you pull the pigtails from puberty
and squeeze mothers and prostitutes
from the girls we really are.

Because Disney fooled us:
we awoke, sweet-sixteen, embittered
with no kiss, no carriage, no prince.

Because the heroines of our youth taught us
the plastic passivity of our sex.

Because we couldn't be factory-made beauty too.

Because we have spent too long courting tears
and making life-rafts of our pillows.

Because we want the power to reject
our presence, our affection - even our indifference
and not feel our hearts unbeating because of this.

Because, in feminism, we find the fairy Godmother
we were always denied by being real - but constructed.