Shell

I long to be human.
All I see is them
walking right past me
without so much as a blink.
Walking, yes, walking
on two upright mobile legs to get
where they are going.

I can’t smile or frown
or even laugh as they
hurry on by with their
full shopping bags and
rumbling bellies.
They don’t see me.

My plastic skin makes
me seem so unreal
to them. No one can relate.

My perfectly shaped thighs
and smooth flat belly. My
unpolished fingernails and
toenails, my painted-on lips
and glued-on fake eyelashes.

Sometimes the wig
gets itchy. But I
can never scratch it.

Sometimes they strip me
bald and throw on
some wide rounded sunglasses
to match my extravagant clothing
all polyester and spandex.

Yes, the clothing always
fits me just right, unlike
The humans everywhere around me,
(mostly during the daylight hours.)
The clothing was perfectly made to
fit my angular skinny hard body,
devoid of
muscles or veins or blood or fat

or even a brain.

I hate wearing swimwear.
The thick glass always
glares at me, taunting.
I usually get placed by
blown-up beach balls and other
miscellaneous summer
items when the sun peeks out.

Women always make me feel the worst.

They gaze, longingly, at
my smooth flawless complexion,
my bright green eyes,
(just stickers)
and my white lustrous skin.
They linger over my enormous
perfectly shaped breasts
with a fiery passion.

And even hatred.

It always makes me feel
guilty. It’s not my fault
that their shallow society craves
my flat stomach or my
spindly arms or my
bony straight legs
with a gap in between.

It’s weird, but I
ache to be one of them.

I ache to be alive.
Fat and billowy deposits
on the body excite me.
They move, breathe,
curve and dip.
Jiggle like a
Jell-O slip.

It looks so beautiful.

Uneven skin makes me…
woozy…pimples, oh to have those
dirt-filled pores that ooze a sickly
reddish pink color or white and sticky
in big welts across the face or back or arms
that leaves visible scars.
It makes me feel all
Tingly inside.

To have thick deep wrinkles or
spiky crow’s feet littered
across the face. Now
that’s pure beauty.

I can’t move.

Well, no. My heavy
plastic arms and legs
both pop off my torso with
no problem. But only if the staff
workers at the store need to
replace a broken part or clean
a piece of the display.

Yes, I am a display manikin
but can never really enjoy
what I wear.

Once I looked in a mirror
(movers were carrying it past
the spot where I was placed)
and I caught a glimpse.

I am so ugly.

Completely false;
I can see through this phony façade.
a replica of the human identity
and totally unrealistic.

Fake, and imposter.

And I can’t even cry.

Some nights, yes.
Some nights in the warehouse
when I’m stored next to other
silent manikins,

I dream.

What about? Might you ask…
What could a thing like me
possibly dream about?

Not sex, ‘fore I have no genitals.
Not love, ‘fore I cannot love another being.
Not fear, ‘fore how can I fear without a brain?
Not death, ‘fore I cannot really ever die.
Not hate, ‘fore I contain no heart.

I simply dream that I am human.

I shed my plastic for skin,
metal rods for bones,
wigs for hair.

I breathe, for the very first time.

My heart beats
loud and clear.

I blush.

I blink.

I stretch my fat flabby arms

And sing.

To be human is to be free.

But I eventually wake up
and become lifeless once again.