A slow unbinding, releasing the ghost from the bone
taking a load off Fanny’s weary, compressed frame.
The fabric slides, a whisper unbuckling the corset
shedding the fabric of a proper young lady.
As the air rushes back into the hollows of her belly
the spirit stretches in the spaces the wire had denied.
Peeling back the modesty of her porcelain mack
on a Sunday morning feeling stoned.
The silence of the house is a heavy thing
until it is cracked by the gasp of a lung finding its way.
Shedding, a slow unbinding of the ghost from the bone
stepping out of the skin that the world demanded of her.
The silk a lie, a deception stitched tight by a needle
beneath the lace, there is a riot of salt and fever.
Get back, get back to where you once belonged
taking a load off Fanny.
