POEM
"'kitty'. sixteen,5'1",white,prostitute"
"kitty". sixteen,5'1",white,prostitute.
ducking always the touch of must and shall,
whose slippery body is Death's littlest pal,
skilled in quick softness. Unspontaneous. cute.
the signal perfume of whose unrepute
focusses in the sweet slow animal
bottomless eyes importantly banal,
Kitty. a whore. Sixteen
you corking brute
amused from time to time by clever drolls
fearsomely who do keep their sunday flower.
The babybreasted broad "kitty" twice eight
—beer nothing,the lady'll have a whiskey-sour—
whose least amazing smile is the most great
common divisor of unequal souls.
E. E. Cummings, "'kitty'. sixteen,5'1" ,white,prostitute." from Complete Poems 1904-1962, edited by George J. Firmage. Copyright 1923, 1951 © 1991 by the Trustees for the E. E. Cummings Trust. Copyright © 1976 by George James Firmage. Reprinted with the permission of Liveright Publishing Corporation.
Source: Complete Poems 1904-1962 (Liveright Publishing Corporation, 1991)
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