Sweet Life (Poetry)

She doesn't see herself as others see her
but surely, in odd moments, she suspects
those bulging Lycra leggings fail to flatter,
leave taste and fashion both severely stretched.

Sweet by name but seldom sweet by nature,
survivor of four offspring and a life
unthrilling in its bland suburban structure,
no siren she, this large unlovely wife.

Her dough-like countenance a cross enigma,
eyes squinting from pink puffy folds of flesh,
her mouth a wound where words cut sharp and ugly
an image heightened by her choice of dress.

She stands, the solid bulk of some beached tanker,
her kids, like tugs, attend in disarray,
squat chunky-trainered miniatures of mother -
the scary junk food products of their day.

An aura of aggression hangs about her,
her youngest grizzles, scarlet face a mess,
a puckered gargoyle spouting tears and chocolate
all down its Teletubby-patterned vest.

Small wonder Mrs. Sweet resents her station -
that name's the biggest irony of all -
her foghorn voice a booming affirmation
of gross graffiti on life's washroom wall.

She's vastly overweight and pushing forty,
dreads that day, all thoughts of growing old
censored in a bid to halt the process
now it's too late to break the outsize mould.

She dare not wish for miracles of science,
genetically she's doomed to stay this stout,
while underneath the fat's unyielding layers
a lissome version wrestles to get out.

The world has sold her short on looks and money,
her lager-loving spouse a string vest slob,
resigned to flexing flabby rolls of blubber -
he's stuck in some mind-numbing dead-end job.

And romance seems a dream for other people
where slender women waltz with dashing men,
marry rich, work out to keep their figures
and never buy from catalogues again ...

A bustier in black to lure a lover,
stiletto heels and fishnets catch an earl
dallying among the lower classes,
reeled in by some quick social-climbing girl.

Mills and Boon her fantasy escape route