Two Poems for Canadian Women Studies /les cahiers de la femme: Women and Fat Studies: Feminist Re-Visionings
Volume 35, No 1, 2. Spring 2023
Gift for Granted
Big I swagger is more fun,
finding comfort in my own
skin. I celebrate belly
button, birthing, navel of
the world, all the more to
round this mound around.
The glitch is a gift, part of
a total packet offered—to
accept the flair of fat, of fun,
an immense and funny presence.
*
To my future
husband, I looked into sea-green eyes
and an ice floe melted inside.
A thin wire of nerve shivered in
recognition. Was I ready to
relax age-old tension and dissolve?
Would I accept this gentleman’s offering
of which he was apparently unaware?
I knew his gargantuan belly
would soon become my own by
fifty pounds. A trade-off
I took on, fair play for
decades of martial fare.
He took this poor poet out to dinner
and I devoured every morsel.
Penn Kemp 