NaPoWriMo 2021 Day 5: Baby Baby (It's Showbiz)

Prompt: This prompt challenges you to find a poem, and then write a new poem that has the shape of the original, and in which every line starts with the first letter of the corresponding line in the original poem.

This was another bit of blank staring for a while - for whatever reason, this April is a hard write, but maybe it's because I've been away from writing for so long, and recovery (as well as adjusting back to work!) has been taking up a great deal more energy than I expected.

The poem I ended up choosing to use is 'Barbie Chang's Tears' by Victoria Chang, which was...difficult, until I came across the account of Hana Kimura's death from last May, and the circumstances which led to it. After that, the poem sort of unraveled slowly, but still in a direction I didn't expect.

Barbie Chang’s Tears

BY VICTORIA CHANG

Barbie Chang’s tears are the lights of

              the city that go off on

off on the men walking around the city

              move but Barbie Chang

doesn’t she cannot promote herself if

              she had legs she would

stop begging if she had a head she

              would stop her own

wedding but the city has no extra

              bedding it is not

ready yet the maids are still making

              beds Barbie Chang is

still making things up there are always

              storms long arms drinks

with pink umbrellas because they know

              she is confused like a

seahorse light avoids her town on

              the map B2 C4 she

wants to be used she doesn’t want to

              be with you it is morning

again and Barbie Chang is already

              mourning the men the

night men who are always right who

              never write back

she prefers to sleep on her back so she

              can see the eyes of her

attackers in the morning a bed with

              questions with her

depression on each side two small

              holes from knees

DAY 5: BABY BABY (IT'S SHOWBIZ)

Baby Gurrrrl sits on the edge of

             the pretty pills that will

oeurve her small life into dayglo glamglitter

             make her into the

darling she's never managed to be if

             she had her choice she'd

stop trying to see if her small voice

              would splash a wee

window in the winner-takes-woopie

               brazen-it-all-out

rack-and-ruin sea she has drowned in

               blind as a dead dog

so many things she punkglamprecious

               starsoftlovestarved

wants to antidote she's a bright red

               shoe being polished to a

showbiz-shine she has no choice she

                wants to vanish she

wants to not care she didn't want to

                 be your personal darling

android-sweet Baby Gurrrrl is everyone's

                  meth lab the men who

note each flip and swim-swam sway of

                   nitro hips the

squee-women who follow like bees so they

                   can dip their tongues in her

adoringthick knifesweet nectar of shamefame

                   quotient for kicks

devoured like a pill she sinks

                    help won't come