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.

Comments

  1. This really speaks to me. I hate the way that we are made to feel wrong if we are not standard issue people. It stops me going to places, and doing things, unless otherwise equipped with wheelchair or buggy.

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