The Frosting on the Cake

Reading Trollope’s Can You Forgive Her

For the second time,

After a two-year hiatus

I come across the word “podgy”:

“You’re a podgy man, you see,

And Mrs. Greenow doesn’t like

Podgy men.” Immediately I remember

That the baby otter in Kenneth Grahame’s

The Wind in the Willows is named “Portly.”

But “portly” is not “podgy”

So I look up “podgy” in Merriam-Webster’s

New Collegiate Dictionary –

Only to find “adj., something pudgy.”

Then, researching that word,

I find it means “being short and plump.” 

That is all I needed, for my mind

To start to rollick (“to move or behave

In a carefree joyous manner”).