The Revolutionary Costume For Today

Oh, hi! Thank heaven you're here
You look absolutely terrific
Honestly. Mother wanted me to come out in a kimono so we
Had quite a fight...

The best kind of clothes
For a protest pose
Is this ensemble of pantyhose
Pulled over the shorts
Worn under the skirt
That doubles as a cape.

To reveal you in capri pants
You fashion out of ski pants
In a jersey knit designed to fit
The contour of your shape
Then cinch it with a cord
From the drape.

And that's the revolutionary costume for today
To show the polo riders, in khakis and topsiders
Just what a revolutionary costume has to say
It can't be ordered from L.L. Bean
There's more to living than Kelly green
And that's the revolution, I mean.

Da da da da dum...

Just listen to this: The Hamptons Bee, July, 1972: "The elderly
Bed-ridden aunt of former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy
Mrs. Edith Bouvier Beale..."

My very own mother, can you imagine?
"...and her adult daughter, Miss Edie Beale, a former debutante
Once known as Body Beautiful Beale..."

They called me Body Beautiul Beale, it's true. That was my whaddyacallit
My uh ... Sobriquet.

"...are living on Long Island in a garbage-ridden, filthy 28-room house
With 52 cats, fleas, cobwebs, and virtually no plumbing. After vociferous
Complaints from neighbors, the Board of Health took legal action against
The reclusive pair."

Why, it's the most disgusting, atrocious thing ever to happen in America!

You fight City Hall with a Persian shawl
That used to hang on the bedroom wall
Pinned under the chin, adorned with a pin
And pulled into a twist.

Reinvent the objet trouvé
Make a poncho from a duvet
Then you can be with cousin Lee
On Mr. Blackwell's list
The full-length velvet glove hides the fist.

And that's the revolutionary costume for today
Subvert the Chris-Craft boaters
Those Nixon-Agnew voters
Armies of conformity are headed right your way
To make a statement you need not be
In Boston Harbor upending tea
And that's a Revolution, to me.

Staunch!
There's nothin' worse, I tell ya
Staunch!
S-T-A-U-N-C-H
Staunch women, we just don't weaken
A little known fact to the fascist pack
Who comes here for antiquin'.

Da da da da dum...

Honestly, they can get you in East Hampton for wearing red shoes on
A Thursday, and all that sort of thing. I don't know whether you
Know that—I mean, do you know that? They can get you for almost
Anything—it's a mean, nasty, Republican town.

The best kind of shoes to express bold views
Are strapless mules in assertive hues
Like fuchsia or peach, except on the beach
In which case you wear flats.

When I stood before the nation
At Jack's inauguration
In a high-heeled pump
I got the jump
On Jackie's pillbox hat
Just watch it where you step
With the cat!

And that's the revolutionary costume pour du jour
You mix 'n' match and, Presto!
A fashion manifesto
That's why a revolutionary costume's de rigueur
The rhododendrons are hiding spies
The pussy willows have beady eyes
Binoculars through the privet hedge
They peek at you through the window ledge with guile!

We're in a Revolution!
So win the Revolution with style!

Da da da da dum!