When I’d Rather Be Inscrutable #2
I flick my areolas taut, turn my pimpled
back on meaning. I mean to wallow,
linger, luxuriate in lukewarm bathwater
gone cloudy, let it crawl down the drain.
The nipples look an awful lot like
scrunched-up brains. Brainy nipples!
What a thought! You can touch them, I
don’t mind. They’re a little lacking in
sensation, though make up for it in
sheer size. Always, always, they’ll round
out, distend, go slack. I often call them
silver dollars, silver dollar pancakes. My
personal pepperoni fit for pepperoni
pizzas. Small cymbals signifying
nothing, necessarily. I don’t mean to be
evasive. I mean to be a spinster: self-
isolate, dodge, duck, bobbin, weave. I
mean to wobble on my own terms, not
fall down. I mean to let the cello of my
body resonate, be the best Jell-O it can
be. I mean to make deep sounds sound
unmournfully. To be a manatee—fat
forever and ever, amen.
Burger King Crown
celery, cookies, breadsticks, protein shake. The fat man does
what he wants, jumping jacks, jack shit, calisthenics, kinky shit,
magic tricks, runs around in circles, just for kicks. The fat man
doesn’t fast, fasts, diets, doesn’t diet, rests his large arms
on his broad belly and smiles. The fat man wears
sweat pants, crop tops, booty shorts, dangly earrings, horizontal stripes,
a bumblebee brooch. The fat man takes up space.
The fat man deserves to, steps back & need not shrink.
The fat man spins around a pivot point, round and round
and roundly around he goes, where he stops the world swirls itself
pretty, gentle, soft. The fat man folds
his laundry, his thong underwear and tube socks,
whistles Somewhere Over the Rainbow while he works.
While he works, Somewhere Over the Rainbow whistles
itself in his ear: there’s a land there’s a land there’s a land.
So the fat man breaks every mirror he sees (fuck bad
luck, longing) & makes a mosaic from all the shimmery,
sharp shards for his house’s façade. The fat man looks
out the open window, naked, glinting, & the neighbors don’t mind.
The fat man wants a word, would like to speak to the manager
of metaphor. The fat man brushes his teeth bloody, forgets to,
gets gingivitis, gets cavities, gets them filled, brushes his teeth
more regularly and that’s that. The fat man still doesn’t floss,
drink enough water, send his mother birthday cards. The fat man sings
himself & There’s a Hole in My Bucket, Highway to Hell & Believe,
…Baby One More Time & Cardi B. The fat man admires his breasts,
does dishes, calls his sister. The fat man goes about his business unmolested.
Going about his business unmolested, the fat man feeds
the meter, the laundromat dryer, his ego, himself.
The fat man’s pants slip down insistently, just enough to show
his ass crack, & no one notices, makes plumber jokes, says a thing,
or shames him into buying one more belt that just won’t work.
The fat man gets fucked, fucks, is fought over, eats ass,
has his ass eaten, is desired, is satisfied, is wanted, is all good.
The fat man does not forsake the chocolate shake, the brown
butter sauce, the barbell, the dumbbell, the many heavy weights.
The fat man frowns sometimes; his face does not freeze like that.
The fat man is fat & knows it & says so & no one ever tells him he isn’t
in an attempt to be nice, as if to say, But I like you. And the fat man fits
as intended into every article at the Goodwill while the fat man
is more fat is less fat is as fat is just as fat, is just as fat—& it was good.
Cameron Martin (he/they) is a fat & queer essayist & poet originally from Michigan. His writing has appeared in Sonora Review, The Normal School, Palette Poetry, and elsewhere. They are an MFA candidate in poetry at the University of Idaho, and the co-coordinator of the ‘queer minded, queer hearted’ reading series Pop-Up Prose. He has a Twitter addiction (@CMcLeodMartin), ADHD, and a chip on his shoulder. They currently “live” in Moscow, Idaho.