Fat Tuesday is my favorite holiday of the year! I love a day meant for a little indulgence. This year I decided to share two poems that will encourage you to enjoy the day and indulge. The first one is a just a short poem called “Diet Pill,” and the second is a poem called “Jean,” which after being diagnosed as diabetic was my overall experience with one (and almost every nutritionist that I had contact with). They were fascinating older ladies and this one encounter sort of inspired me to write a poem. Hopefully these two poems will encourage you to ‘indulge today,’ as we all need one day to indulge where there are no ‘diet pills,’ and no ‘Jean’s’ sucking us in. Enjoy your Day!
Diet Pill
I made you into a diet pill.
Swallowed you down with water.
Hoping miraculously you’d melt
My insecurities.
Instead, I just lost my appetite.
When I forced myself to try to savor you,
Binge on you.
I lost none of my extra baggage and insecurities.
No weight lost.
Just a lot of time sitting on the toilet
wondering if you were worth the discomfort
of all the shits, devoid of giggles.
Jean
She lived alone, a TV dinner
chef, who insisted
the dinners really improved over the years.
I’m sure she had a pill container,
30 days, sort of like an advent calendar.
Multi-vitamins definitely included.
Jean, who put herself
through schooling, with her job of plastic fruits,
Cut out coupons, TV dinner boxes to show you the nutrition label.
Jean, who insisted,
with her snark and eye ball rolls, singles
should eat TV dinner, drink Crystal Light, enjoy Lite FM
and take lunch every day, at 11 AM sharp
In the company break room with a TV dinner
To keep up to date on The Young and the Restless.
With her rubber in souls
she’d power walk after work outside if above forty,
at the indoor track at the YMCA anything below.
I’m sure she had plenty of Tupperware,
Attended every girl on the units Mary Kaye parties,
But it was the Tupperware ones she lived for.
Jean, with her insurance plan and low deductible
Is an unruly dog to deal with when I tell her
“I don’t really like TV dinners”
I’m uncooperative, perhaps, we should just end.
You know…they’ve gotten a lot better & I’m single.
I’m single too and they’re just so easy!
Jean, who makes me want to take back my words
I want to be single for the rest of my life-
If it means someone to cook with so my taste buds never say
They really have gotten tastier and improved,
Jean, who proves, even your palette blends
when all you can taste is your single, serving microwave dinner.
Oak Roads: Poetry and Musings 