Christine Heppermann Quotes

Gingerbread
I knew I had to get out of there
before the icing cracked and they discovered
that I'm burnt around the edges,
doughy in the center,
that what they thought was sugar
is salt.

If I was a good girl,
if I could satisfy their cravings,
if every dream in my misshapen head
didn't bite, I might have stayed at the table.

Wouldn't you run, too,
from such voracious love?

If you find the dividing line between fairy tales and reality, let me know. In my mind, the two run together, even though the intersections aren't always obvious. The girl sitting quietly in class or waiting for the bus or roaming the mall doesn't want anyone to know, or doesn't know how to tell anyone, that she is locked in a tower. Maybe she's a prisoner of a story she's heard all her life- that fairest means best, or that bruises prove she is worthy of love.

And those women were sneaky. They understood that including fantastical elements in their tales- golden eggs, signing harps, talking frogs- worked to mask a deeper purpose....it made the stories look on the surface like 'a mere bubble of nonsense' within which it was possible to 'utter harsh truths, to say what you dare' about the state of women's lives. Because they were just stories, right? Harmless little fantasies?

But here's a great thing about stories: they can be retold.

To avoid reproach, I learned how to pose as a Good Girl, but even that persona couldn't completely shield me. It seemed that, for girls, there was no such thing as "good" enough.

You can lose your way anywhere.

What the miller's daughter should have said
from the start
or at any point down the line is,
no.

How stupid that all I have to do
is grow two squishy lumps and suddenly
I'm man's best friend

No need for a bunch of trees.
You can lose your way anywhere.

Nature Lesson

The dress code says
we must cover ourselves
in
ample pants,
skirts that reach well below
our lascivious knees,
polos buttoned over
the rim of the canyon,
a glimpse of which can send a boy
plunging to such depths
he may never climb back up
to algebra.

We say
that if a hiker strays
off the path, trips, and
winds up crippled,
is it really the canyon's fault?

Rubenesque: the word for masterpiece curves. Screw you, unsalted rice cakes.