One of our first columns, published in 2005, had to do with a pair of high-heeled red shoes, and some trouble they brewed up, and now, at last, we have a pink pantsuit to go along with those dangerous pumps.

This delightful poem is by Nancy Simpson, who lives in North Carolina.

Pink Pantsuit

It hangs around the wardrobe
for days, dull,
or reclines in the hamper

like a flattened flamingo.
I wash it in soft water.
I give it new life, and what thanks?

It walks out the door with my legs,
through the gate,
headed straight for the racetrack.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright 2010 by Nancy Simpson from her most recent book of poems, Living Above the Frost Line, Carolina Wren Press, 2010. Poem reprinted by permission of Nancy Simpson and the publisher. Introduction copyright 2014 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.