old wives tales
heading advice we know is garbage
and choosing to wear sweaters
just because our mothers are cold
eating apples obsessively
because of embarrassing rhymes
unworthy of even the worst poetry
books
and brushing our teeth for three
whole minutes for reasons we remember not
but surely have something to do
with some sort of film of black and white
cartoon
narrated by our grandfathers
but forgetting all along
our bodies (be they ours or someone else’s)
still end up in dust
and mold eaten by that which even
we would not dare to eat
whether you help us out or not
we’re only postponing our inevitable
trips to that eternal golf course above