Denise Duhamel
The Ugly Duckling Who Remains An Ugly Duckling
She has oily skin when she is young
but doesn't grow up to be a model.
She had no waist then and has no waist now.
Her face is covered with a light down,
her oversized lips spit when she talks.
Her skinny legs look lost on her long wide feet
as she waddles home after a night school class.
You might guess that she turns out to be a genius,
that she discovers something no one else knows
or makes millions of dollars using her hunches on stocks,
but some ugly ducklings don't get even that.
Sometimes she pretends she's a swan,
and glides through a minute or two towards the end of her day
until she smashes into another ugly duckling doing the same—
their grocery bags full of Doritos, Nuprin
and Major Video rentals ruined in the muddy puddles.
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