Bib Overalls

High fashion for coeds in ’74.
Not with brown speckles around the cuffs
from herding twelve cows to their stalls.
Not thin at the knee from pitching hay
or greased-stained from oily wrenches.

These flashed intriguing brass buttons
northeast and northwest of her sternum,
provocative bulges at Berkeley and Boston.
Sufficiently sexy, rebellious enough,
in a peer-reviewed way.  High tide
of the flow of campus excesses:
not a stitch up to the cheeks last year,
today it’s denim to the chin.

And ugly as hell, the old guys grumped
in the barber shop, remembering
shorter skirts and better days.

I remember a big-boned girl
giant-stepping through the snow
in the mini-est of mini-skirts.
Her bright red thighs reminded me
of an ostrich farm in winter. 
Perhaps she was a rural girl,
longing for bib overalls.