I spent two bits in 1968,
to buy a little book put out by Dell.
Its title – Count Your Calories – was great:
the pamphlet matched my purpose very well.
I’d dieted four years and added more
than I reduced, and more than growth excused.
Considered smart, I set out to explore
the formulae for how our fuels are used.

Then armed with numbers and a pyramid,
I dieted and taught my friends and kin.
Explaining it was simple: to be rid
of weight takes self-control and discipline.
And I was wrong. Perhaps it was my youth –
I trusted scientists to tell the truth.