Branded Laughing

this morning a memory came up

sliding down from the top

of the screen and stupid me

I clicked on it and suddenly

I was shown a carousel

of pictures from twenty three

years ago when I was just a baby

adult trying on this brand and that

and sure enough there was an idiot

dancing in front of the camera

wearing skinny jeans and a puff

jacket and a corduroy tie

at which I just had to chuckle

as I remembered my mother

telling me when I was a teenager

buying the biggest JNCO jeans

that someday I would look back

at pictures of myself and laugh

but little did she know her brand

and little did I know my brand

back then when we were not the ones

branded for real in those days

aside from cows in the fields.