In Defense of Ana

[everyadventure]

Hunger is comfortable company:
a tender wriggle, a twist, a twinge,
to curl your arms about and cradle
like a bastard fetus.

Food is a whore; you return for more
three times a day, trying to distend
your hollow places!

Let me choose, instead,
to fill those spaces
with private glory
and pious stasis.

[MystyrMystyry]

http://i1134.photobucket.com/albums/m605/mystyrmystyry/dinner1.jpg

Buuuuuurp!!!

[hallaig]

Something about pious stasis trips me up. it's the sound. I like stasis. Maybe you should drop the pious!

[everyadventure]

Ha, MM, you always make me laugh. Pass the plate, my friend :)

[PrinceMyshkin]

One is bound to wonder who or what "Ana" is. If it has some religious connotation, knowing what it is might help to set one up for the "pious stasis" of the conclusion, which is otherwise not prepared for.

But clearly there is some sort of renunciation of the world going on here, and how masterfully succinct it is! And "Food is a whore" is a stunning observation or remark!!

[Dude]

I am delightfully confused. Thank you. :D

[hillwalker]

I'm guessing Ana is anorexia - or the Pro-Ana movement that actively promotes anorexia amongst adolescent girls...

...if I'm right it all makes sense.

H

[MystyrMystyry]

Ha, MM, you always make me laugh. Pass the plate, my friend :)

'An Offensive Dinner' that picture. See what I've done is the poem's called 'In Defense Of Ana', and I changed-... Oh forget it...

(That was a delicious meal actually - whole orange chicken, chips, gravy, salad and garlic bread! For desert triple chocolate icecream with chocolate chip cookie crumbs! Unfortunately I didn't take a picture of it at the finished preparation stage for hunger reasons - but I remembered to afterwards, and it is this that you see!)

[Jerrybaldy]

I remember losing much weight through a rough time and loving it and scorning food and the weak people who needed it whilst I felt my superiority and private glory and as such I think your poem captured this a little bit brilliantly.

[Delta40]

I instantly thought of Pro-Ana too. That sanctimonious, I'm in control while others are not sounding final few lines convinced me.

[everyadventure]

@Hill & Delta, bonus points for the both of you.
@Jerry, you're correct, there is no one more self-righteous than an anorexic!
@MM, I was WONDERING if you'd taken that photograph... but then I tried to imagine you cooking what appear(ed) to be a whole roast chicken, and dismissed the idea. Love your title!

Thanks all for reading.

[Bar22do]

What a wonderful brief summary of anorexia nervosa. I'm tempted to pass this to a psychiatrist!
Very well done, ea, including "pious".

[Hawkman]

Really good, ea.

Best, H

[PrinceMyshkin]

I haven't stopped thinking of this poem since I read it. As to Hallaig's objection to the mouthful of sound in "pious stasis," I think it may serve to hold our attention a bit longer on the vivid ambiguity of that phrase, which I think can be read in either of two ways:

1) As an alternative to being buffetted or to running between hunger and gluttonous excess, pious stasis may hint at the one point that is forever still, i.e. God, or

2) in the close context of "private glory" (the sin of pride), it may indicate the false piety of choosing never to develop, to choose spiritual or emotional paralysis...

[everyadventure]

@Prince, I'm unsure of the close S's in piouS StaSiS, but both pious and stasis hold the context I want. What's a poet to do when the right words are the wrong ones??

[MystyrMystyry]

Static piety?

Nah.

Don't listen to him - he's just jealous...

[everyadventure]

I'll forgive your jealousy, MM, as it has landed me on page two ;)

[MystyrMystyry]

Not my jealousy - Munchkin's!

[AuntShecky]

Far be it from me to dismiss or diminish the suffering of those plagued by emotional or psychological stress, i.e. the
"nervosa" part of anorexia nervosa. Mostly affecting adolescent females in the Western world, the ailment often stems as a reaction of the teenager trying to take control of her own body, or more likely, a way to assert herself. One book about the disorder carries the title: Starving for Attention.

I have to wonder, however, whether this illness is not a symptom of an overindulgent, over-affluent society whose
core values are out of sync with those of the rest of the world. For instance, we would never hear of an adolescent girl in Asia or Africa, for instance, suffering from anorexia.
Millions --billions perhaps-- are "starving" for real.
So I might say that anorexia nervosa is merely the flip-side
of epidemic obesity as well as some of the affluent society's
rather disgusting attitude toward food: "recreational eating," "fourth meal," and the like.

I think that your verse approaches the subject realistically in a subtle manner and might serve as a springboard to serious discussions on the topic.