Why would my Weight Watchers meet in a restaurant
that’s a buffet where diners can eat all they want?
I guess it’s to practice resisting temptation,
but instead I am feeling severe perturbation.
Potatoes and gravy and chicken and peas
and desserts where a person can eat all they please
are simply not kosher when one should be dieting.
Instead of resisting, I find myself rioting.
I charged up to the counter and filled up my plate
with a pile of entrees I’m ashamed to relate.
Then muffins and crepes and strawberry pie
spilled over the sides and reached up to the sky.
Something about me was slightly off-kilter,
and I found I was eating without any filter.
If they’d pared down the menu, I’d have much less naughty,
and the folks at my table might have looked way less haughty.
My table mates clucked and looked sad and disgusted.
It was clear at buffets I was not to be trusted.
Yet I noticed also some looks of regret
as they surveyed these goodies that they, too, could get
if only they had the nerve to break ranks:
scalloped potatoes and baked beans with franks,
chocolate eclairs and ice cream with hot fudge
all could be theirs with nobody to judge.
Yet what could it hurt, just one serving of gravy?
Just one piece of chicken, one biscuit and maybe
one serving of pudding without the whipped cream?
Would one scoop of vanilla really be extreme?
I saw resolve falter as one after one
they returned to the line for a muffin or bun,
chicken fried steak or some pork or some shrimp—
first with restraint, then ceasing to scrimp.
And that’s how I broke up our Weight Watcher’s bunch
after a single ill-fated lunch.
I’m not proud of my actions and the resolves I’ve killed,
but at least for the present I’m sufficiently filled!
Prompt words for the day are filter, naughty, meeting, pare and menu.
Loved this poem, I was going to do something similar, but with another slimming group.
LikeLike
So, send a link when you finish.
LikeLike
I went, with my mother, to visit my mother’s twin at a home for elderly people a day and a half ago. Yesterday, I mentioned that I’d had cheesecake and ice cream for dessert. My mother said, surprised or outraged, “You had two desserts?”
I told her I’d eaten half of the cheesecake serving and half of the scoop of chocolate ice cream. Then… she asked, as if carrying out an inquisition, “You didn’t finish your dessert?” I enjoyed your story in rhyming form. Eclairs sound fabulous.
LikeLike
Ha! Mothers. No pleasing them! Hard to imagine eating just half a piece of cheesecake and just half a scoop of chocolate ice cream. Our protagonist could have polished off all of both.
LikeLike
Loved it! I could actually imagine it while reading the poem.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Did it make you hungry, Shreya?
LikeLike
Sure, it did! But, I am a vegetarian 😛
LikeLike
Haha! Hilarious use of the prompts
LikeLike
this is a funny look at the horrors of dieting, Well done Judy.
LikeLiked by 1 person
This was hilarious and slightly sad at the same time, Judy. I dislike buffets because I have little willpower! After I read this I saw my WW email about a deal on a healthy food cookbook…yep, I ordered it!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I need to do the same. We’ve been naughty but I’m trying to stick to the fast schedule at least. I think I’m the same weight I was when I left home.
LikeLiked by 1 person