Eat Me by Patience Agbabi: AS Level

Eat Me

by Patience Agbabi

When I hit thirty, he brought me a cake,
three layers of icing, home-made,
a candle for each stone in weight.

The icing was white but the letters were pink,
they said, eat me. And I ate, did
what I was told. Didn’t even taste it.

Then he asked me to get up and walk
round the bed so he could watch my broad
belly wobble, hips judder like a juggernaut.

The bigger the better, he’d say, I like
big girls, soft girls, girls I can burrow inside
with multiple chins, masses of cellulite.

I was his Jacuzzi. But he was my cook,
my only pleasure the rush of fast food,
his pleasure, to watch me swell like forbidden fruit.

His breadfruit. His desert island after shipwreck.
Or a beached whale on a king-size bed
craving a wave. I was a tidal wave of flesh

too fat to leave, too fat to buy a pint of full-fat milk,
too fat to use fat as an emotional shield,
too fat to be called chubby, cuddly, big-built.

The day I hit thirty-nine, I allowed him to stroke
my globe of a cheek. His flesh, my flesh flowed.
He said, Open wide, poured olive oil down my throat.

Soon you’ll be forty… he whispered, and how
could I not roll over on top. I rolled and he drowned
in my flesh. I drowned his dying sentence out.

I left him there for six hours that felt like a week.
His mouth slightly open, his eyes bulging with greed.
There was nothing else left in the house to eat.

Meaning

This poem is narrated by a female character who seems to be the victim of a man who feeds her because of his sexual fetish about large women. Like a cautionary tale, the man ends up being suffocated by the woman when she rolls over on top of him. 

Narrative

The poem begins with the narrator being presented with a celebration cake, either for a birthday or for reaching thirty stone. Like Alice, she obeys the 'Eat me' instructions and, like Alice, grows larger. After eating the cake, the narrator is ordered to walk around, praised for her size. The narrator reflects on the pleasure that he has in her size, in her physical appearance and in his control over her inability to go outside. When she reaches thirty-nine stone, he pours olive oil down her throat and orders her to lie on top of him which she does, drowning him. The last line of the poem in which she reflects that there is nothing left to eat in the house, suggests that she will have to eat him too, since he has made her housebound and hungry.

Form and structure

The poem is presented in ten tercets (three line stanzas), possibly presented as bites of food, given as tasty morsels to the greedy suspicions of the reader as we develop a response of anger towards this man. Is the narrator 'feeding' the reader, greedy for our negative reactions towards him?

The rhythm of the poem follows an irregular beat which flows more like the natural patterns of speech, urging us to trust the narrator as she tells us her story. 

There is an almost-regular rhyming pattern present throughout. Every first line (apart from the eighth tercet) ends with a 'k' sound, every middle line ends with a 'd' sound and every third line (apart from the sixth tercet which doesn't operate on its own because it is linked with the seventh) ends with a 't' sound. This gives a loose or half-rhyme of 'k' and 't' between every first and third line, making it sound half-right and uncertain, as if mirroring the tone of the woman in her nervous anxiety. However, as we become more suspicious of the woman, this half-rhyme may also be presenting her as a rather unreliable narrator who cannot be totally trusted. 

The use of pronouns 'I' and 'he' distances us from the male character in the poem and pulls us onto the side of the woman.

The sixth and seventh stanzas seem linked by an enjambement but also by theme: both tercets are about the woman's size. This gives the effect of the poem itself growing like the woman as the tercets link together in performance. 

Language (by tercet)

1. When I 'hit thirty' - imagery of a birthday with 'cake' and 'candle' but the celebration involves odd details such as 'three layers of icing', and it seems to all be about her weight, not her age - 'a candle for each stone'.

2. The imagery carries on sweet and feminine with 'icing', 'white' and 'pink' but the imperative 'Eat me' and her obedient response makes it sickly. Short, incomplete sentences are unsettling. 'Didn't even taste it' makes us wonder if the act of eating for the narrator is desensitising her.

3. The verbs 'he asked me...so he could watch' bring his fetish into sharp focus. The consonant 'b' sounds in 'broad belly wobble' and 'j' in 'judder...juggernaut' make the sentence comic, slowing it down as we imagine this massive woman, almost in slow motion, mesmerised.

4. Repetition of 'girls' makes the narrator seem unloved, just one of many, giving him a sexual pleasure indicated by 'burrow inside'. She becomes an object who is special to him only in her size, not as a person.

5. 'Jacuzzi' is given a capital letter, perhaps the name he called her. The shaking, warm, comfort of the idea encapsulates all that he values about her. Pleasure for her is 'the rush of fast food', not the taste. Just like the cake, no mention is made of the sensory enjoyment of food. They feed off each other in an odd relationship.

6&7. These two stanzas work together, describing her sheer size. There are images of colonisation, 'breadfruit...desert island...shipwreck' in tropical references, giving her a conquered feel. The obvious repetition of 'too fat' is a wordplay of rhythm, building up into a crescendo of control as we realise that she is not able to go outdoors due to his say so . It is unnatural.

8. The narrator seems to regain some control in the relationship when she 'allowed him to stroke my globe of a cheek'. The image of her size turning into gushing rivers of fat echoes around the wordplay with 'his flesh, my flesh flowed' and 'poured olive oil down my throat'. They are becoming one, not in the act of sex but in the consumption of fat.

9. The man's ecstacy reaches a crescendo as he whispers 'soon you'll be forty' and the reader realises that it is her weight that is increasing rather than her age. Although he continues to repress her by doubting her 'could I not roll over on top', she continues to be obedient and suffocates his body and his controlling words 'drowned his dying sentence out' with her flesh. 

10. The uncomfortable last tercet presents an image of a still-greedy man, 'mouth slightly open...bulging with greed' whose body is being watched for six hours by the woman he has trained to eat. A woman who is trapped inside because of him. We anticipate that she will eat him. The final sentence is a matter-of-fact statement from a desensitised woman. Their flesh will become one in cannibalism.

Revision questions

1. Who is the victim?

2. Who is in control?

3. How does Agbabi use sensory description to make her meaning clear?

4. How is the theme of greed developed?

5. Why is this poem called 'Eat me'?

6. Is this a feminist poem?

7. In what ways is this a cautionary tale?