No Freedom For the Poor, by Linda McQuarrie-Bowerman

At the Moulin Rouge, by Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (France) 1890

No Freedom For the Poor

Your shadow pools beneath you, dignity dissolving as you dance
for men whose respectable womenfolk watch from a distance

no doubt grateful for the fate of birth. You leap 
as if to hurtle closer to the freedom shining fresh and green 

as peacocks plumage beyond wide clear windows, 
men in morning coats standing like rusty barricades intent 

on stopping your escape and later, as you lie exhausted, 
does your lover count the francs you earn? does he 

leave you just enough to buy new petticoats 
and pointy high-heeled boots, the soles eventually disintegrating

as will you from years of forced frivolity. Today 
your hair is burnished bronze; 

tomorrow's lack of hope will dim its glow to grey. ​

Linda McQuarrie-Bowerman

Linda lives in Lake Tabourie, NSW, Australia by the sea. In this beautiful environment, she writes poetry and has recently dabbled in flash fiction. Linda is completing her degree in Creative Writing at Curtin University and enjoys seeing her work published in various literary spaces. She is a recent Pushcart Nominee thanks to the The Ekphrastic Review.