I Will Wear My Green Dress by E.L. Douglas (Florida, 19)

The green dress is stuffed in the back of my closet,
A sign of femininity long ignored.
The twine holding the bag together is fraying.
The tag is smudged but I know what it says:

For graduation.
Love, Mom.

The green dress laughed at me then.
It still does now.
A witch’s cackle, a voice painfully familiar.
A girl your size? Lipstick on a pig.
Every attempt at dressing up was ridiculed.
Every nice outfit was replaced by jeans and a tee shirt.
The same ones I wore to my graduation party.
Black jeans, black shirt, black socks, and dirty Converse.
Camouflage to blend into the shadows.
To disappear from sight.

I remember how my mom’s face fell when she saw me.
The silence in the car.

I graduate college in a week.
As I look at the green dress,
Suddenly, I’m eighteen again,
Thinking of a thousand eyes on me.
Judgemental.
Critical.
Cruel.

But I’m not eighteen.
I’m allowed to wear pretty things.
I didn’t know that then.
I do now.

I will wear my green dress,
Just as I should have,
All those years ago.





E.L. Douglas is a nineteen-year-old sophomore at Florida Southern College. They are majoring in psychology with a minor in English. They hope to graduate in 2026 and use their degree to help children find disability accommodations in the classroom. They enjoy weaving elements of their psychology learnings into their poetry wherever possible.