Acid-wash jeans, created by treating denim with chlorine bleach and pumice stones to create a mottled, high-contrast faded pattern, became a massive fashion trend in the mid-1980s. Popularized by brands like Guess and Marithé + François Girbaud, the style was embraced by teenagers and pop stars, including Madonna and Michael Jackson. The acid-wash craze represented the mainstreaming of the distressed denim aesthetic and demonstrated the power of novelty in fashion cycles.

The acid-wash jeans trend, with its aggressive artificiality, became a subject of fascination and critique for poets of the 1980s who were interested in the aesthetics of surfaces and the construction of identity. The style's association with pop music and youth culture also inspired poets who wrote about popular culture, from the New York School to the performance poets of the East Village. The acid-wash look, with its deliberate imperfection, mirrored the postmodern interest in fragmentation and pastiche.