Dingo the Dissident

THE BLOG OF DISQUIET : Qweir Notions, an uncommonplace-book from the Armpit of Diogenes, binge-thinker jottings since 2008 .

Saturday 2 December 2017

"Stinking rich"

most likely refers to the smell
of the rotting teeth in their mouths,
from eating sugar, white bread and cake.
The silver spoons put into their mouths
as babies did not protect them.
The poor were reduced to selling
their teeth which were healthy
from eating rough bread and ....ation
(though their gums were destroyed by starvation).

The rich also stank in courtrooms.
They feverishly chewed garlic, caraway, cardamoms
to prevent infection from the breath of the poor
whom they sent off to New England
then to New South Wales
for petty larceny - for the jails
were even more crowded than they are today
in England and the U.S.A.

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