Eh?

Eating a slap-up meal on Saturday, and eh?

Can’t taste the consommé, nor yet the cheese soufflé.

What’s going on? No flavour in my pear parfait,

No hint of honey either in this Chardonnay.

No subtle note of chocolate in my café au lait,

Nor even in my box of Cadbury’s Milk Tray.

Is it a dreaded symptom, this response decay?

Am I infected by Coronaviridae?

I take a wretched lateral flow test right away.

And two red lines appear, to my profound dismay –

Alack-a-day! No bloody way, José! Oy vey!

So I’ve to promptly isolate sine die.

On Sunday to the drive-in centre near the Stray

To take the needed PCR test – nowt to pay,

And soon we’re back at home and I must hide away

In the spare bedroom like the Picture of Dorian Gray.

But though I now am fated only to survey

The world through double glazing, comes the old cliché

To mind – a change is good as any holiday.

On Monday morning early comes a text; “O pray

Absent yourself from Britain’s streets – don’t disobey.

You’re dangerous, and out of worldly sight must stay”.

They ring to question me; I finger a café

Where we had tea and lemon cake the other day.

I’d thought the cake was moist and citrusy. It may

Have been a great deal tastier than I can say.

Monday night is TV quiz night, hip hooray!

My brain still functions; I can tell Monet from Manet.

I spend the greater part of Tuesday wrapt in wordplay –

November’s Genius crossword is no holiday,

But super-satisfying when it goes my way.

So to the genial compiler, a bouquet.

Wednesday I have time to read some Hemingway,

Swann’s Way, the play The Second Mrs Tanqueray,

Collected poems of Edna St Vincent Millay,

The Master of Ballantrae, a sexed-up dossier,

A catalogue raisonné of the oeuvre of Man Ray,

A roman a clef, and also Fifty Shades of Gray.

On Thursday the government is seen in disarray,

Reversing what it whipped its troops to yesterday.

Owen Paterson the innocent lamb protests foul play

And leaves the cruel world of politics and paltry pay.

John Major weighs in hard, and so does Lady May.

It cheers me up no end, this Tory auto-da-fé.

Hoping my sense of taste’s returning, I essay

A generous glass of Beaujolais or Cabernet

As generally I like to do on any Friday.

It gives a nice sensation, though no flavour, mais c’est

La vie. But – as the wellness tribe are wont to say –

Don’t worry, it’s OK not to be OK.

Refer to: Nov 2021 – Oh my days!
Day after day