Tea with the Poet

We are going to tea with a poet.
Confidences poured out –
‘One lump or two? Milk?’
– and passed round the table.

Hot toasted paragraphs
dripping with melted adjectives,
sentences with the crusts neatly cut off,
a tempting selection of metaphors –
‘Must watch the figure’
– laid out on a plate for us to choose from.

It is teatime with the poet.
‘A second cup? Certainly.
Pass the haiku. A villanelle?
Go on, spoil yourself.
Sure you haven’t got room for a sonnet?
Oh, very well.’

Time to go.
He brushes up a few commas from the tablecloth
and, with a polite semi-colon;
shows us to the door.

from Wish You Were Here. Published by Jonathan Cape 1990.