The Nutritive and Therapeutic Uses of the Banana:
(a treatise in horticulture funded by the United Fruit Company)
And I was serving tropical drinks
in that posh cafe
quenching arrogant souls
Perfumed against the heat
all of us dying by degrees
And in you walked
your school years past
Full of private boarding snobberies
Where hired help tended
only the best cloistered gardens
Camouflaging whispers
uttered by selfish tongues
cultured with proper generations of money
And I was serving tropical drinks
quenching arrogant souls
When you told me in that fashionable cafe
During the passing of a happy-hour
Your boyhood recollections
of Central America's bountiful harvests
all those "Great White Ships"
of your dear father's fleet
And the power
of true Yanqui dollar diplomacy
Gathering fruit from a continent's loins
Your elegant arm outstretched
beckoning me to refill your glass
You said watching dark-skinned natives
carrying circumcised limbs
of bananatrees up those rotting planks
deposited in the bleeding maw
of America's dark hold -- was difficult
And all the while
I was serving tropical drinks
perfumed against the truth
wondering about natives losing their colour
bleached away by a benevolent company
planting wreaths of pure pain
As you solemnly explained how one poor fellow
stung by a tiny green snake
dropped his precious cargo
Sliding in death -- down that walkway
You plopped another oyster
of grey remorse into your mouth
Devouring it like all the others
Ripped fresh from their innocent beds of burden
As you told me you would never forget that sight
full of imported rum
and the fresh snapped spines of bitter lime
In that fashionable cafe
all of us dying by degrees
Patronized by your family’s yellowing wealth
Passing a life of supposed happy hours
As you confessed to me it was such a pity
such a dreadful pity
about those poor fellows dying by degrees
and to charge this brief afternoon’s penance
to your chilling account of privilege.
Author notes
Zyskandar A Jaimot
A contest entry
- So.... you're a poet huh? And you don't like to ryhme? by Melissa Burns.
375 points, ended March 6, 2008, 14 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest - PRE-WRITES! ROUNDS CONTEST!!! by Luminescence.
525 points, ended March 23, 2008, 176 entries
• next poem in this contest, remove from contest
The Nutritive and Therapeutic Uses of the Banana:
Comments
1 - 7 of 7
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hehe... a poem about bananas deffinatly the first that I have recieved in this contest.... This was very well done...
Title- 10
Diction- 10
syntax- 10
wowness factor- 9
total- 39 wow great score...
Thank you for entering and participating in my contest and good luck,
~lumin -
You plopped another oyster
of grey remorse into your mouth
wow, you are good
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never really 'good' but ise hopes to be entertaining/of interest thank zaj
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Wonderfully poetic write full of description and metaphoric phrases. Tells a story in free verse that is true poetry.
We eat a lot of bananas, but buy organic ones when they're available. We believe in buying fair trade goods. The grower gets a fairer price for his goods, and grows them in a more ecologically sustainable fashion.
You've convinced me that we're doing the right thing.
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part of my family founded 'the united fruit co from back bay boston' and my father was one of the last managing directors of that firm and their 'hold' on central america - which the successor companies still have regards zaj
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" Perfumed against the truth" " Dying by degrees" Oh the poet can tell a tale and regale the reality, one man's means means of existence meets one man's mode of prosperity and the irony is that the nutritive componenent of the banana is the blend of natural magnesium that is beneficient for depression, two bananas a day will ebb and keep it at bay naturally, yet when it is the only food of fortitude it adds the degrees of latitude that add weight to the perceverence when 'tis white man that reaps the price set within market place. Yet again the poet voices pertinent points poetically. Kudos.
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incredibly - basically an all factual true account of a night in a bar in NEWPORT much thanks for the read/too kind laudatory comments regards zaj
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