Dressing

Oliver Gifford
1 min readFeb 11, 2020

My lover is a suit of clothes
And the three of us —
my dimensions,
her weave,
our fit —
are a Trinity:
Equal, distinct, inseparable.

Were I like Fred Rogers,
Weighing in at 143 pounds of
I-love-you every morning of
My life, I would have
But one love
To fit me like a glove
’Til death do us part.

But seeing how I wax and wane
Like the moon,
I must wear flowing dresses
That let me breathe,
And run away
Until we snag on thorns and
Fall apart, and I’m left
Joyously naked, moonlit.

Else I must accept that until
The pendulum of my being
Slows its wild swinging
And settles on a true path,
Some suits will stay in the dark
Corners of my closet
If I can’t fit into them, and
Can’t let them go.

In the grey morning,
When I get dressed,
Whether I’m too fat
Or my clothes too cheap
For my rich dreams
Are tomorrow’s fields to sow.

Tomorrow I can grow
The body of my dreams, bespoke,
And reap threads of gold.
The question for today is:
How do we fit together now?

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