The kitten arrived on the very first evening
as if summoned, and
being more than happy to be petted by anyone
was christened Floozy
not very French admittedly,
pouffiasse would have been more appropriate.
Nonetheless Bea had found a friend
who would come every day
for favours and attention, but
being a French mademoiselle offered
very little in return.
Later, as Bea finally gave up
and fell asleep in her mother’s lap
we ate fillet and drank claret
thinking life gets no better.
Sunday, a real Sunday
nothing stirs but the fodder grass,
it’s tall again but not ready for the blade
needing sun as do we.
Only the fractured peal of the Eglise St Martin
measures out the day’s stumbling progress
with an atheistic clank.
Eagerly awaited holiday books are finally creased,
and mysteries, adventures and romances unfold
as a lazy guilt seeps from our bones, and
we exhale from our routine lives.
It’s early half-light, the day already overcast,
and picked out in the car’s headlights
a weak bulb glows through the baker’s window.
The intoxicating aroma of crusty bread
indelibly France.
The greeting is heartfelt, it’s lunchtime for him
loose change is dropped into
the glass dish on the counter, a bientot!
and an insatiable desire to bite
the end off the baguette before starting the car.
On the drive home, skies clear to pale grey,
I skirt the ancient redundant windmill, that
once would have ground the wheat,
and the pigeonnier sentinel amongst
the dripping vines.
It will be dour today, but
the thought of breakfast bread, ham, melon
and superb coffee will lift our spirits.
St Emilion, a happy ghetto wedged in the limestone cleft
multicoloured terracotta rooftops
juxt and cheek by jowl
spill from the plateau to the cote.
This town is riddled like Emmenthal
its Gallo-Roman catacombs, now
fill with wine,
a tourist trap nirvana seethes
with many tongues.
But early, before sunrise
a medieval torpor sits in the lanes
and through the alleys
imagined likely bladesreturn boisterous from a masque
.
© Graham Sherwood 06/2019
