a life in gum

having grown up with a smoker for a father
i have most certainly inhaled my fair share of second-hand
so i never fell for the allure of big tobacco & the
kool kids
still, there have been parts in my life where i have found myself
chewing---
i must admit,
large quantities of gum
have passed through my life in spurts
leaving holes of gumless moments---
the furthest back i remember chomping on
big red---
dad would drive to a gas station & i’d always ask for a
pack
if i remember correctly,
the packs always had an odd number of sticks,
still,
all covered in sugar, my teeth would have completely rotted out of my head
if i continued big red until this present day---
i don’t remember any special visual ad that struck me
which might have made me invest so much time & effort into its chewing
but without squinting my eyes to remember
that theme song is still there
right behind my retinas
“longer with big red---that big red freshness lasts right through it---
your fresh breath goes on and on
while you chew it...etc.”
advertisers are as close to any concept of
”satan” that could truly pass in this ephemeral life

little league will force any kid to stuff big league chew in your mouth
until all your friends start doing the real stuff
& maybe you decide that you don’t want your face to rot off because
you fill your mouth with dripping wet
excrement & then
promptly spit it out afterward

uck.

there were the days where my idiot best-friend & i would try to see how much
cinnamon bubble tape we could shove in our mouths before it burned so much
we had to spit it out---
then, of course, they came up with the
bubble puck, which
was nothing more than just one huge hunk of gum the size of a
hockey puck,
so of course, we just shoved that whole thing in our mouths
trying to cram another in, and alas, to no avail,
we would promptly spit it out as well

i can’t remember when i wised up to the fact that continued chewing of
sugar gum
would take all my teeth,
but i did---
and so the other spurts of gum chewing throughout has been filled with the
sugarlesses---
and of course,
they are going to give you
cancer.