Flackmoth On Etiquette
When it comes to rules of etiquette
be warned: Flackmoth’s easily upset.
Most rules are arbitrary, he insists,
promoted by the bored and idle rich
who see themselves as haute bourgeoisie
with a rigid predilection, you see,
for behavior they deem uncouth and boorish,
vain, shameless and even Neanderthalish.
Whereas he says with pride, nowhere as yet
has Nature laid down a rule of etiquette!
Every thing behaves and acts for its own
pleasure whether as a seedling or full grown.
And that, he says, is as it should be,
for Nature tolerates no artificiality.
Moreover, we humans should be resigned
to act as nature in her wisdom designed.
For all etiquette at best is superficial,
at worse, elitist and hypocritical.
Knives, forks, and spoons, he readily admits,
have advantages, yet all have limits.
Eating should be a fun experience,
not a rule-burdened inconvenience.
Besides, flatware compares miserably
to hands and fingers for dexterity!
(Who eats barbecued ribs or chicken
unaccompanied by finger licken’?)
Humans ate that way for millennia
without incurring any opprobria.
Only within the space of recent times
have bad “manners” been charged as crimes.
One of the worst is flatulence, denounced
for its stench and attendant sound pronounced.
That so natural a relief has incurred
stigma status, Flackmoth finds absurd.
Even science has saved many a lady
her reputation from ignominy
by inventing pills that dispels gas
before it dares escape to embarrass!
(Next they’ll have a pill to eliminate
the mortifying need to defecate!)
Flackmoth believes all rules of etiquette
reduce and corrupt our most human habits
into silly dandified straitjackets.
Imagine sipping soup without a slurp,
or holding back a loud but harmless burp?
And who hasn’t dared to release at table
a quiet tweet with a face respectable?
(Your guests may not detect the culprit
but its odor have no doubt who did it.
Of course, says Flackmoth, not all gas
should be condemned as foul or crass.
Consider the effect when yeast in
dough is placed in a hot oven:
it creates a gas build-up it has
no choice but to release or pass
thus causing the dough to expand
(some would say flatulate) and
double in size –think of it as farting
without foul odors imparting.
But more as an appetizing aroma
released around fresh bread like a corona.
Copyright ©
Maurice Rigoler
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