Salute

Salute

 

The Italians are known for it -

it’s all in the Mediterranean diet

and there are plenty of eggs in Carrefour,

I reminded her, out shopping.

And it’s an odd thing, that guilt

on which two houses of Verona were built,

you know, Romeo, Juliet and Rosaline,

and how you spend your time

like the Gatwick shuttle,

which, I admit, is not a subtle

allusion that I only know by repute.

There’s some moisture in an old flute,

but more in this iced peach tea,

counting beans – one and one is three,

but love is where she lays her head,

on my shoulder, in the bed,

brown almond eyes, brown felt skin,

and everything she believes in,

what is and is and is, is fine,

and we will know what’s right, as time

unfolds to reveal whatsoever.

I think that’s damned clever,

feel I should salute before the mast,

and yet it sticks in my flue -

jagged, in unsavoury blue, bitten in two,

and you swallow and swallow

but it’s wedged stubborn in the hollow

as if snubbing orders to do its work -

even if it relents, does the drill,

there’s an afternoon of feeling ill,

an aftermath of time gentlemen, please,

unwritten schedules and exercise

that might, in actuality, suggest,

it is your Italian that salutes the best.