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DRESSING DOWN | Sarah Piper
When she is desperate
to be well
she tries on
that floral dress
with the silver threads
woven through.
When she is
desperate
to be (a) well (of possibility, a sky)
she makes herself
sparkle
for an hour, maybe two,
until the foil threads
turn scratchy and irritable
and the charade of the dance
feels done.
She undresses
to underwear
and catches her hair
in an elastic—
the only styling she knows
of real,
relieved
to let herself pretend
again
at nothing else, nothing else
for days.
Sarah Piper is a writer and physician living in Northern California. She is a graduate of the Contemplative Medicine Fellowship through the NY Zen Center and is certified in the practice of Narrative Medicine through the Northwest Narrative Medicine Collaborative. Her previous work has appeared in Intima (“Mavis Staples Says to Write About My Blessings”) and Yellow Arrow Journal.