Poem: Morning Meeting

If I fits, I sits.

But I don’t fit, and

still I sit,

In the very back,

Capping the row,

An oversized bookend.

One side gasps for air.

The other

knows my colleague.

Our arms, our thighs

Kiss, make love.

Their mouth, their eyes

Frown, promise retribution

In seething blog posts

Or cruel laughter

Over afternoon cocktails.

My doughy bottom

Rolls across hard plastic,

Sighs, drips over sides.

I torque twist, fold:

Inward, always inward,

In posture if not in fact.

My fat, knotted body

An unvoiced apology

For daring to exist.

Thighs that normally

Clap and steam

Loll, cold and dead,

The only tingle

The electric shocks

Of restricted blood.

Tiny, hinging writing surface

Unfurls –

O Modern Technology!

It bounces on my belly,

Slanting our worldview.

I’ll take notes in my lap

If I can just… reach…

I’ll take notes in my head.

What happens when you

Stuff a peck

Of tender/tenderized poet

Into a tiny,

Industrial coffin?

A drippy, gooey mess

That flows

Across and over,

Coating hard plastic

And hands:

Folded, lumpy,

Wobbling

In pain.

Maybe mass-produced,

Standardized,

One size fits all…

Doesn’t?

Squirting

beyond the boundaries,

Steampressing the legs

Of a coworker

Whose name I don’t know,

Reshifting the messy

Bits that jiggle and shake,

I am a child again:

A naughty, punished,

Failed fat kid.