*The most desirable-size female foot created during this thousand-year era of foot-binding all over China, was 3 inches, called Gold Lotus.  A larger “less successful” binding created a woman’s foot that was 4 inches in length, called Silver Lotus.

This poem series quotes from and elaborates narrative stories told to Joseph Rupp by women who survived China’s foot-binding culture, in his documenting work “When I was a girl in China.”  Copyright 2010, by photographer Joseph Rupp.  These extraordinary stories were told to Mr. Rupp by elderly Chinese women who actually survived the experience.  I have used many of their own verbatim phrases and whole sentences so that these amazing women can speak for themselves.  I have taken poetic license with their stories, mixed and recombined many pieces, but tried to stay true to the women’s experiences and their voices.  I hope I do not tarnish their unconscious bravery, or misrepresent what might have happened to any one girl who ever endured this form of cultural torture until foot-binding was at last outlawed in 1949.   Joseph Rupp’s work:  www.Josephrupp.com/story 1116.html