Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Sprinklers & Sparrows


I get my gum from Parsippany, New Jersey

Chewing gum reduces stress

(The trouble with breathing is That you always have to keep at it Again and again Like your heart beating And thinking about it doesn’t do any good It only makes it worse One time you might step off of a curb And down and out Into the street Right in front of a bus That might be it for you)

You can’t bribe somebody with an IOU

Saying have a good day a hundred times a day
But never meaning it even once
Serves its own purpose

My gum contains sorbitol, maltitol, mannitol,
acacia, acesulfame potassium, aspartame,
BHT,
candelilla wax,
glycerin, sodium stearate,
soy lecithin and titanium dioxide.
It is made by Cadbury Adams,
Whom I imagine to be a robust, hearty and hale man,
with a wispy shock of auburn hair.
A guy who bales hay and wakes up at the crack of dawn,
Who maybe smokes a pipe on his porch while the cicadas sing in the twilight,
And whose gum factory
In Parsippany, New Jersey
Churns out tiny square pieces of gum by the thousands
All the live long day.


White letters
on the
gum packaging 
proclaim
that my 
gum has been

CLINICALLY

shown to 

WHITEN 

teeth



(I rest reassured)