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15.1  Burning Feet

My red swollen feet burn
like the heating coil
inside a boiling kettle,
building up heat,
till the heels jerk
with cutting pain!

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15.2  Tightly Wrapped Foot

My left foot is like a rice dumpling
tightly wrapped with bamboo leaves
and tied with a strong string
cutting deep
into my skin, soft sole, and bone.

It burns like a swollen, cooked dumpling
with the rice and beans inside wanting
to burst through the bamboo leaves.

Trying to loosen up the strings
the foot protests in spasm.

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.

15.3  Bound feet

My feet are very tightly bound
with long cloth laced with warm coarse sand:
Burning inside and outside,
yet numb to touch on the surface.

Was that how my ancient sisters felt
in their little, forcibly bound feet?

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 15. 4  Beautiful Feet

Ah!
How beautiful my feet are this morning!
Not patchy
No botchy redness
No fluid retention
Wrinkled toes
Flat and skinny
with clearly visible veins and arches.
Like they used to be not long ago.
Where are my beautiful, slim-line Italian shoes?

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© 2015 K-KLokePhD

An Electric Kettle in Use. Photo by Lee J. Hayward. In public Domain, via-http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brita_kettle.jpg

Bamboo Leaf Rice Dumplings. Zongzi.  Photo by Koika.
CC AS-A 3.0 Unportes License, via –
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Zongzi#mediaviewer/File:RiceDumpling.JPG

Bound Feet of a Chinese Lady (Die verkrüppelten Füße einer vornehmen Chinesin. (1911). Photo by Albert Friedenthal. In public domain, via –
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Foot_binding#mediaviewer/
File:Die_verkruppeltenFusse_einer_vornehmenChinesin.jpg

A Slim-Line Shoe. Photo by JHCompany. CC0 Public Domain License, via –
http://pixabay.com/en/high-heels-shoe-women-s-shoes-606308/