The Fifties*

The Fifties

Everyone urging

A return

To the hidden styles

The plastic smiles

The careful wiles

Meanwhile

god

Was in his heaven

And his heyday

While the rich

With missionary zeal

Protected siblings from the heartaches

Of the past.

The skirts were long

The lights low

(but nothin’ ever happened, you know)

unless the girl was cheap

and that made it alright anyhow

because you never brought her home to mother

who came very expensive

The cheap chippies

Name and fame

was whispered

to friends

so when they married

their virgins

would come clean.