It’s often been said, that it’s hard to intuit,
The long-term effects of a diet of Inuit,
Whalemeat and seals and polar explorers,
But we entertain no illusions that it’s any good for us
–
From time to time we swear, we’ll eat more sensibly henceforth,
But the culinary forecast is cruelly grim up north,
There’s nothing to commend in the polar bear’s repast,
Its coriaceous blandness would drive anyone to fast
–
For something pleasing on the palate, yet gentle on the gut,
We search in vain the tundras, but there’s almost Nunavut
We shouldn’t want for choice living in a refrigerator
But, Juneau, we’d all be happier in a cave near the equator
–
So hard is it to creep up on a tern or albatross,
That our efforts to eat poultry have come to a dead loss
And penguins, though more sluggish, haunt the wrong side of the globe,
And sadly thus don’t offer hope to the ursine hodophobe
–
There’s no salad to be found in Svalbard archipelago
You’ll never get a radish, and curly kale won’t grow
And the early nordic settlers should hang their heads in shame,
For bestowing upon Greenland such a cruel, ironic name
–
The grizzlies gnosh on salmon and the pandas scoff bamboo,
And sloth bears in Seoni can eat pears and paw paws too
But we binge on whale blubber as we wish our lives away,
Compounded by the fact that we’ve turned prematurely grey
–
The Inevitable Asterisk 