Читать книгу Time Will Clean the Carcass Bones - Lucia Perillo - Страница 12

How Western Underwear Came to Japan

When Tokyo’s Shirokiya Dry Goods caught fire

in the thirties, shopgirls tore the shelves’ kimonos

and knotted them in ropes. Older women used

both hands, descending safely from the highest floors

though their underskirts flew up around their hips.

The crowded street saw everything beneath—

ankles, knees, the purple flanges of their sex.

Versus the younger girls’ careful keeping

one hand pinned against their skirts, against

the nothing under them and their silk falling.