Can you believe this is already the FOURTEENTH End of Month Egg on Toast Extravaganza?? No, me neither. But here it is, and the challenge this month was to sumbit your eggy, toasty dish in the form of a parody of your favourite poem or poet. Oh boy, did we get a selection!! Percy Bysse Shelley, Edna St Vincent Millay, Edward Lear, Andrew Marvell, Edward Fitzgerald, Lewis Carrol, Sylvia Plath, Lord Alfred Tennyson, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, John Donne, WIlliam Carlos Williams and, erm, Iggy Pop. There’s hardly a genre of poetry not catered for in that lot!
So here’s my roundup, based loosely on TS Eliot’s marvellous The Lovesong of J Alfred Prufrock
Let us go then, you and,
When Owen has spread a gently fry
of scrambled eggs and mushrooms upon the table.
Let us go through certain half-deserted streets
Where Elizabeth still eats
hard-boiled eggs with chill paste & pita,
Her guttering candle burnt at both ends.
The muttering retreats
Of Emma’s meals in one-Michelin star hotels,
And souffle restaurants littered with eggshells.
Menus follow like a tedious argument
of gastronomic intent,
To lead Anne to an overwhelming question:
Oh, do not ask “what is it?”
Let us go and eat poached egg and turkey on toast.
In the room the bloggers come and go,
Talking of manchego and membrillo.
The lovely Sam who wraps her hand around the eggshell.
The lovely Sam who coyly looks at Fred,
Licks her tongue into the corners of the toast
Where the poached egg yolk lingers in pools.
And there will be time, Ashwini, there will be time
To prepare some spicy masala French toast
To meet the diners you might meet.
There will be time to murder and create
And time for all the works of Iggy Pop
That lift and drop Spicey’s BBQ eggs on your plate
Time for you and time for Zabee(na)
And time for a hundred calorific indecisions
Before taking two-tone pasticcera for tea.
In the room the bloggers come and go,
Talking of manchego and membrillo.
And indeed there will be time for Cyndi to wonder
“Do I dare? Do I dare?”;
Time to whip up eggs goldenrod and descend the stair.
For Jennifer has already known them all,
Has known evenings, mornings, afternoons,
She has measured out her huevos rancheros with coffee spoons.
And would it have been worth it after all
After the egg, the pussycat and peas
Among the porcelain, some talk of Stephanie?
I grow old, I grow old,
Shall I wear the bottom of my apron rolled?
Shall I slice the wurst just so? Do I dare to show a leg?
I shall pick tomatoes an keep them in a keg.
I have seen my breakfast sizzling, wurst and egg.
I do not think it will disappoint me.