Heat and A.E. Housman
(St. Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin)

We sat side by side
on recliner chairs,
uneasy drip-fed companions
for the day.

She wondered about me,
shifting in her chair
on the verge of
conversation,

But not being ready I
kept my eyes fixed steadily
on my book,
(A.E. Housman
A Shropshire Lad).

She cast sidelong glances
at it as she flicked
her magazine,
Heat!

From its front cover,
Jordon with newly
liposuctioned lips,
pouted at me.

I kept my book half closed
to hide the verse,
but she, being vigilant,
saw the words slip off the page:

Lovliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,

She shifted again
and peered closer.

And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

She spoke,
“There’s tea and biscuits
Going free,”
she said.
“If you’re hungry!”

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

“I’m only telling you,” she said,
“because
I can hear your stomach
rumbling from here.”

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

“And you can borrow
Heat
if you like,” she said,
flicking the pages
at me again.

I closed my book.
I reached for Heat
And smiled.

“I’ll catch up on my gossip,”
I told her.

“Do that,” she said,
“And I’ll get us a cup of tea.”