image from plasticstoday.com
Pachyderm in the Parlor
“Each and everyone of us has unknowingly
played a part in the obesity problem.”
--Indra Nooyi.
Sustenance
is one of the big words,
like truth, love and liberty,
multi-layered and faceted.
Its definition encompasses space
between starvation and spirituality.
Our absolute need for it
supersedes everything
but our desperate need
for air and water.
I used to do a lot of hiking
and camping out for days
deep in our Northwest forests.
Fish may be caught
and berries may be picked,
but most of our meals
would come from the food
we packed in on our person.
A variety of freeze-dried delicacies,
but when you are hungry from hiking
the processed foods taste mighty fine.
That was one of the rare times
that I would only eat what I needed.
The good air and exercise seemed to
reduce cravings. The week’s provisions
did not include snacks.
Scientists and nutritionists inform us
that our poor food choices
are endangering our health & longevity.
Fast and processed foods, steroid-
ravaged beef, chicken and pork
wreak havoc with our entrails;
fats, sugars, and calories
all act as our adversaries.
Damn, you hit middle age
like a melon against a brick wall,
and you are presented with a new label
in your medical chart--
you have become morbidly obese.
Out of self defense, you take a handful
of chronic meds to combat
hypertension, stroke, heart attack, gout,
asthma, cholesterol, and blood clots.
Come on, we fully understand our dilemma,
more’s the pity, but without the high metabolism
of a manic teenager, we spend painful
decades dieting and binging.
Sadly, we pass on this conundrum,
this legacy of poor food choices
to our children. Shame on us.
Maybe, as some believe, when
Jesus returns at the last moment
to save the planet from global warming,
he can do something miraculous
about our attitude adjustments
regarding sustenance.
Glenn Buttkus
Posted over at dVerse Poets Pub
10 comments:
Read my haibun. No obesity problems there. I used to camp in the wilderness are of the NC mountains (Where Last of the Mohicans was filmed). I loved it. Now I am old and arthritic.
I like how you expand the notion of sustenance. The beginning of your poem, especially, is very true.
I love these lines:
"Its definition encompasses space
between starvation and spirituality."
and
"Damn, you hit middle age
like a melon against a brick wall,"
I used to be thin, with the help of voluntary starvation and smoking cigarettes. What is different about a food addiction and other addictions is that you have to eat to live. A food addict has a defective circuit when it comes to enough, at both extremes.
I'm not one for taking pills, but if I could take 1 pill 3x/day and just stop eating I would.
Very good way to put this: "Damn, you hit middle age
like a melon against a brick wall," Unfortunately the habits do get passed onto our children.
That legacy of poor food choices stuck with me. I blame greed and consumerism for the marketing of some much processed food. But in the end, the choice to live healthy lies with us. I am thankful I don't take any medications for now,just my vitamins.
I love the alliteration and vivid image of the title, Glenn, and the move from sustenance, the ‘space between starvation and spirituality’, survival in the wilderness, to:
‘Damn, you hit middle age
like a melon against a brick wall’.
I know what you mean, Glenn, and it’s not pretty! I used to be a skinny streak of nothing until various health problems started to creep up on me and one day I realised my waistline wasn’t what it should be. Food never bothered me until then – now I crave what I can’t have.
Ah a topic I know so well...
So much truth here Glenn. The fight to stay fit gets harder as we age.
Oh ... it's all in the genes... we are designed to starve and eat as much as we can when food is available, we are made to walk with food on our backs I think.
Honest and uncompromising as always, Glenn.....particularly in your description of middle age...middle age and midriffs!
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