Don't Cheapen Yourself

You look sleazy tonight

ma said.

Cheap, I said.

I’m doin cheap.

You got any idea

how much it costs

to do cheap these days?

To do gold City of Paris

three-inch platform sandals

and this I. Magnin snake dress?

I’m doin cheap.

You look like a bird, she said

a Halloween bird with red waxed lips.

—In high school

you could either do cheap or Shakespeare,

college prep or a pointy bra,

ratting a bubble haircut

with a toilet brush.

I was not allowed to do high school cheap;

I did blazers and wool skirts

from the Junior League thrift shop.

In high school it was

don’t walk in the middle of

Richie, Leelee, and the baby,

you might come between them.

You look like a skag

wearin that black-eyed makeup,

people are gunna think you’re cheap.

While I poured red food dye

on my hair

to match my filly’s tail for the rodeo,

ma beat her head against the wall,

she said

tryin to make me nice.

I tried real hard,

but the loggers, the Navy guys,

they always hit on me.

Cause you’re an easy mark, ma said.

And I played guilty,

I played guilty every time.

But now, I said

now I’m doin cheap.

Copyright Credit: "Don’t Cheapen Yourself" from Pin Money. Copyright © 1976 by Jungle Garden Press. Reprinted by permission of Jana Harris.

Source: Poem's from the Women's Movment (The Library of America, 2009)