Thank you, Elizabeth Arden.
Behind your Red Door,
you have made my face
perfectly oblong,
shatterproof.
My head swathed in bandages,
my body in a white gown,
I am a patient
at your hospital of beauty.
Only you, Elizabeth Arden,
know my true mind,
what lies behind this mask
that I hold — only you know
the secrets
to perfect eyebrows,
a mouth that says nothing
except
that I was here.
____________________________________________________________________________________________
Today’s prompt at Imaginary Garden with Real Toads was to use one of two photos. I chose this one, which is by Adolph de Meyer, for an Elizabeth Arden ad from 1927:
Marilyn Rauch Cavicchia 
This is an excellent take on the picture., particularly addressing it to Elizabeth Arden. Shatterproof is such a good descriptor, and the mouth that says nothing. And the whole idea of our society’s ideas of beauty and femininity is spot on.
Thank you! The face in this photo looks so intelligent, but so harshly “done” at the same time.
I like that “hospital of beauty”…..as if the natural face needs to be “fixed”. LOL. Love your response to the prompt.
I love, love, love this!💜 So often beauty is misread by people in society and innocence destroyed by “hospital of beauty.”
I like this a lot,,you have captured the photo so well, I especially like the lines
“I am a patient at your hospital of beauty.” It is sad that so many, men and women, who think they need it to face the world.
“the secret to perfect eyebrows”… and oh how THAT image has changed over the years! Beauty seems to be fickle.
What everyone else says. Plus, I like the play on Arden’s Red Door, and the last lines about the “mouth that says nothing / except / that I was here.”
Dark, sardonic and wonderful.
I love this! Our obsession with beauty. I am captive tho!
Thank you! I was thinking I might do a whole bunch of poems about beauty.