Compassion Wears Protest Peach Lipstick

by Jeannie E. Roberts

After the news, cut to break, thirty seconds splash, flash

glamour, and she’s back—posing in studio before focused

lens. She had an affinity for fashion, its flair, artfulness,

though she was plagued by its fleeting nature.

Acknowledging her doubts, knowing the importance

of inner focus, she taught self-development in tandem

with commercial modeling. Besides turns, pivots, and poses,

she addressed internal beauty, the parts that blossom,

effloresce with age. What she didn’t or couldn’t prepare

her students for was the stigma, the marks that wound

a woman who models or has modeled, the blanket perceptions

that tarnish, diminish, and alienate, the comments that cause

injury: she’s vain, selfish, spoiled, stupid, a real phony.

Why would anyone want to be her friend? She’s not welcome

or invited. We don’t want her sitting at our table or near

our husbands!

When did physical beauty become a form of disability?

Why does elegance trigger offense? How do we shift

hostile and intolerant attitudes into acceptance?

Imagine a world where comparisons didn’t exist,

where human beings had the ability to look beyond physical

appearance, to put job associations aside, had the decency

to practice kindness, inclusion, and civility . . .

After the news, cut to break, thirty seconds splash, flash

glamour, and she’s back—much older now, settling into

her map of lines and wrinkles, wearing protest peach-

colored lipstick, lifting her voice for the next generation,

compassionately speaking out for beautiful women,

hoping that they may live without the burden of bias, labels,

and the insidiousness of lookism.

* * * * *

Jeannie E. Roberts has authored four poetry collections, including The Wingspan of Things (Dancing Girl Press, 2017), Romp and Ceremony (Finishing Line Press, 2017), Beyond Bulrush (Lit Fest Press, 2015), and Nature of it All (Finishing Line Press, 2013). She is also the author and illustrator of Rhyme the Roost! A Collection of Poems and Paintings for Children (forthcoming from Daffydowndilly Press, an imprint of Kelsay Books, 2019) as well as Let's Make Faces!, a children's book dedicated to her son (author-published, 2009). She is Poetry Editor of the online literary magazine Halfway Down the Stairs and a member of the Wisconsin Fellowship of Poets.