When I was Racist

When I was young
And felt a little glum
My Mum would cheer me
With a plum.

I began to eat them daily,
Demolishing entire punnets
With aplomb.

How I loved those big, fat,
Red-purple fruit bombs
Juicing between my lips,
Never failing to elicit
A contented 'Yum!'

But one night after
Dinner my Mum
Offered me a yellow one.

I turned my head
And mouthed disgust
At the pale, pus-like
Imitation of my habitual
Fruity dream feast.

This fruit was diseased.
I refused to feed.

I snubbed that sickly grub.

My mother paused,
Then held her breath,
Turning black
Like an overripe plum.
"You know what your problem is,"
She cried. "You're racist!"

Then she took the entire
Crate of plums and pelted
Me until I was welted
With plum coloured bruises.

"You see, discoloured plums
Still have their uses!"

Now I am grown up
And Minister for Equal Opportunities.

On a celebrity reality TV show
They hooked me up
To a lie detector machine
And asked me if I had
Ever been racist.

I blushed (like a plum).









At the fresh fruit stall
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Poem Study Notes:


Written in around 2014, this poem grew out of a desire to play on plumb/aplomb. The results were pleasingly random.

Just the other day the local Tesco Express was selling yellow plums. They were delicious!

Most reality shows these days seem to have become celebrity reality TV shows. Is that because we have reached a sort of saturation point, where every non-celebrity member of the population has appeared in a reality TV show, becoming a celebrity in the process, expanding the celebrity pool, diminishing the non-celebs ... and so now it is easier and cheaper to staff these shows with celebrities ... non-celebrities are becoming an endangered species!